


you want to die for love, you always have

by helloearthlings



Series: Everybody Plays Along [1]
Category: King Falls AM (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Alternate Universe - Hunger Games Setting, Angst, Character Death, Dystopia, Friendship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Multi, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-09
Updated: 2018-06-18
Packaged: 2019-05-20 07:36:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 34,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14890313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helloearthlings/pseuds/helloearthlings
Summary: Sammy didn’t feel it at first, even as the crowd around Grisham gasped. Sammy’s Games were more than a decade ago. They’d long faded away, as horrible as that sounded. But there was a Games that haunted him even more, one that floored him fast and hard, and suddenly he found it difficult to breathe, something like tears blurring in his eyes though they felt too hot, too painful, more like acid than anything else.District Five had Victors to choose from. Death had stopped scaring Sammy a long time ago.What rattled him to his core was that District Twelve didn’t have Victors to choose from.  District Twelve just had the two. Just had Ben Arnold. Ben Arnold and Emily Potter.That – that was worse than death. Ben Arnold and Emily Potter back in the Games, after everything they’d been through, and Sammy still alive on the other side. There was nothing worse than that.





	1. Someone’s pulling a gun, and you’re jumping into the middle of it.

**Author's Note:**

> So you guys didn't know it, but this is actually the year 2012 and I, the hackiest of hacks, wrote a Hunger Games AU.
> 
> Well, the first chapter of one. I promise there'll be two more, because this chapter just wasn't hacky enough for me, and I need to fulfill my hackiness quota for the next couple lifetimes. I'm excusing myself because this fandom doesn't really have AUs yet, so I'm actually a trendsetter and not doing possibly the most cliched AU to ever AU.
> 
> Fuck I missed AUs, though, guys, I love sculpting my sweet, sweet canon parallels, and this one's gonna have a fuck ton. I hope you all aren't too disgusted with my hackiness and hang out in My Angst World for awhile, 'cause I'm actually having a great time writing this. I'm getting myself through this hiatus one hacky trope at a time and you should, too.
> 
> Also, despite my writing this, I really do know almost nothing about the Hunger Games. It's been like four years since reading or watching them, and yet somehow this still exists??? If you're a big Hunger Games fan, I know I'm probably wrong about something, and you can absolutely let me know when I am, because again, I'm here to be hacky and write angst and nothing else.

Sammy was half-drunk when the Quarter Quell announcement came on his television set. He’d been drinking steadily in preparation for it throughout the past couple of hours. Drinking never made Sammy feel any better about his life, but it couldn’t possibly make him feel worse.

The Quarter Quell announcement could certainly make him feel worse, though, and to be at least partially numbed to its affects would hopefully help him sleep for the next year until the Games started up again, an endless circle he’d be spinning for the rest of his goddamn life.

His life shouldn’t have lasted this long to begin with – should’ve been over by now – should’ve been over a long fucking time ago –

But here Sammy is, listening to Grisham on his television set, his smarmy smile and white suit as he takes the podium.

Last Quarter Quell was double the Victors, maybe they’d go for triple this time around. No, no, the Gamemakers were too creative, too vindictive not to make some new fresh hell that could never be predicted, not by the likes of a half-drunk Sammy by any means.

Grisham droned, like Grisham tended to do, for at least fifteen minutes that Sammy tuned in and out of, because he didn’t need to hear it. He was sprawled out on his couch with just a glass of whiskey for company – alone, alone, always alone, always drove people away, that’s what he did, no one stayed, no one ever stayed – and didn’t quite hear a word out of Grisham’s mouth

They were all about the history of the Games, and Sammy knew that shit like the back of his hand, a decade of countless events with Grisham’s snide drone going on around him. Just like the Games, it was one of his few constants. Misery and pain, Grisham and the Games, the only things willing to stick with him through it all, see him through to the end of his life.

His life – he could barely fucking call this a life. He really should end it, put himself out of his misery. The empty, cavernous house around him wouldn’t even notice he was gone.

“On our one hundred and twenty-fifth anniversary of this glorious tradition…” Grisham’s drone echoed and Sammy hit the volume button, recognizing the sharpness of the words as finally being worth any attention. “We must remind our citizens that the strongest among them cannot overcome the power of the Capitol. Therefore, the tributes of this year’s Quarter Quell will be reaped from each district’s existing pool of victors.”

Sammy didn’t feel it at first, even as the crowd around Grisham gasped.

He started to feel it a second later, that hot and sick pain that filled up every part of his body and writhed with every memory that flashed before his eyes – the sawed-off shotgun, the blood running in the river, his or someone else’s he still didn’t know, still couldn’t think about, the way the death around him felt cold and impersonal until it was just him, Chicken Foot Dixon, and a knife.

But that only lasted half a second. Sammy’s Games were more than a decade ago. They’d long faded away, as horrible as that sounded.

But there was a Games that haunted him even more, one that floored him fast and hard, and suddenly he found it difficult to breathe, something like tears blurring in his eyes though they felt too hot, too painful – more like acid than anything else.

District Five had Victors to choose from. Death had stopped scaring Sammy a long time ago.

What rattled him to his core was that District Twelve didn’t have Victors to choose from.  District Twelve just had the two. Just had Ben Arnold. Ben Arnold and Emily Potter.

That – that was worse than death. Ben Arnold and Emily Potter back in the Games, after everything they’d been through, and Sammy still alive on the other side. There was nothing worse than that.

* * *

 

Sammy and Ben hadn’t spoken in three months, not since their disastrous midnight argument in Ben’s Capitol apartment where he’d torn out the floorboards and hidden his maps, drawings, readings, everything under. All of Ben’s research, those endless scribblings, that number repeated again and again. _Thirteen, thirteen, thirteen…_

“ _Ben_ ,” Sammy said sharply, almost shaking with the memory of another room that looked like this a lifetime ago. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Ben pushed his glasses up further on his nose as he looked up from his endless sprawling of papers from where he sat cross-legged on the floor, eyes only flickering up to Sammy for half a second.“What do you think I’m doing? I’m trying to find out where District Thirteen is.”

“It’s gone,” Sammy said faintly, and then, “Fuck, Ben, your door was unlocked. You don’t even have the blinds drawn.”

Sammy locked the apartment’s door behind him, practically ran to the window to yank the yellow curtains shut. They were too light a color. Someone could see through them if they really tried.

“No one comes here except you and Emily,” Ben said with a wave of his hand that nauseated Sammy to his core.

“Peacekeepers will come here if you’re not more careful,” Sammy said, forcing his voice to sound commanding and clipped and not let his endless worry spill out. “Fuck, Ben, if you’re gonna do this, do it in Twelve, not in the Capitol in broad daylight.”

“I have to do it here, I can’t transport any of my research home, someone would check my luggage,” Ben said, so at least he was thinking about this a little, even if it wasn’t nearly enough. “And the Capitol is where I’m going to find information. Twelve won’t have anything I need.”

“Is that why you’ve been here so much lately?” Sammy tasted bile in the back of his throat. “God, go home, Ben. You deserve to go home.”

“No,” Ben said, finally looking directly at Sammy, his shoulders tightening defensively. “I’m doing this whether you like it or not, Sammy. Don’t even try to talk me out of it.”

“What’s your plan, then?” Sammy tried a different tactic to distract himself from his urge to vomit. “Start a Rebellion and hope they join in? Send an emissary to meet them and plot how best to take over the Capitol, which has far more resources than all of the districts combined? Run away with Emily and hope they’ll take you in?”

“Wouldn’t you run away, if you had the chance?” Ben snapped at him, rising to his feet. It didn’t help him look any more threatening. Ben would be twenty in a few months and still didn’t come up higher than Sammy’s shoulder. But he didn’t even give Sammy time to answer his question. “And no, I’m not running, just so you know. I’m fighting. Something you seemed to stop doing a long time ago, if you ever did in the first place.”

God, sometimes Ben saw right through Sammy in ways he didn’t even understand, and it always felt like a gut punch. Sammy thought he’d been fighter, at least in the beginning, but he’d acquiesced to most everything the Capitol threw his way because he’d been scared, was still scared, was still so scared because once upon a time, all he’d had in the world was Jack Wright, and now all he had in the world was Ben Arnold, and they were both so set on hitting their own personal self-destruct buttons that Sammy couldn’t breathe with the pressure.

“We all have our ways of dealing with this shit,” Sammy said, forcing himself to sound angry instead of lost and spiraling. “What we can’t do is change it. How many people have tried? And then failed? Come on, Ben, think things through.”

“I am thinking things through,” Ben said, his expression unmoving. He was a stubborn son of a bitch. No one could ever tell him no. “And we can’t keep living like this, Sammy. Any of us. Playing lapdog to the Gamemakers, mentoring these kids going to die – we can’t do it anymore.”

It was funny, hearing Ben say _kids_ like his own games hadn’t been only three years ago, like he wasn’t a nineteen year-old boy who had no clue what it meant to disobey the Capitol’s orders. 

“I know it’s painful,” Sammy said tightly, because goddammit, he really _did_. “I know you want to do something about it. And I get that, Ben, you have to believe me – I get it. We live a shitty life here. But what we don’t do is fight back. Fighting back means getting brutally murdered, getting our tongues cut out, getting our loved ones taken –”

Sammy’s voice cracked. Ben stared at him.

He didn’t continue. Couldn’t continue.

A bitter smile twisted on Ben’s face. “You really do follow all of their orders, huh,” he said, his hand shaking a little. “I never noticed before – but you do. You might insult them out of earshot – hell, you might insult them to their faces – but you’ll never directly disobey.”

“Don’t you dare accuse me of being spineless,” Sammy said, knowing what Ben was getting at. “I’ve been through more than you can fucking imagine, Ben. You’re my best friend – my brother – but I’m almost ten years older than you. Been a Victor ten years longer. You’ll understand –”

“I really goddamn hope I never understand how you’ve gotten so cynical,” Ben interrupted, eyes still clear, and Sammy wished that Ben’s life was anything but this, wished that Ben wouldn’t ever become him someday but knowing all too well that he would. “I know our lives our terrible, but that doesn’t mean they can’t get _bett_ er _,_ that I can’t make them better.”

“I’ve seen this before, Ben,” Sammy said, trying his damnedest to keep his voice from quivering. “People who do shit like this end up killed or worse. What would your mom do without you, Ben? What would Emily do?”

Sammy didn’t say _what would I do?_ He knew perfectly well what he’d do without Ben. Or rather, what he wouldn’t do.

“There are some things more important than that,” Ben said, sticking out his jaw. “If there can be a real uprising…”

“But there can’t be!” Sammy said, and realized a second too late that he’d yelled it. He and Ben stared at one another, eyes wide, and they waited.

There wasn’t any response to it from outside the room. Sammy swallowed, a lump in his throat.

He dropped his voice to a strained whisper. “There can’t be, Ben. We might outnumber them, but their technology is too advanced. We’d be wiped out in weeks – days, even.”

“Not if District Thirteen –”

“Goddammit, Ben, no,” Sammy said, resisting the urge to reach out and pull Ben close to him, because right now Ben’s eyes were bright and furious, and he knew that he wouldn’t be calming him down no matter how long they argued. “You can’t risk yourself. Your life. Your potential for happiness. You and Emily – you _can’t_ , Ben. Please. Go home.”

Ben deflated, just slightly, but his eyes didn’t change. “Yeah. Yeah, alright, Sammy, I’ll go home. I’ll go home and talk to Emily about all of this and see what she wants to do next. I’ll talk to my mom. I’ll talk to my friends who I think might be sympathetic, might want to help. That’s what I’ll do next. Maybe you’ll come by and visit and join in the effort – but I doubt it. You always do exactly what’s expected of you. Always.”

“Ben –” Sammy tried to reach out this time, but Ben stepped away from him.

“Go home to Five” Ben said, his voice subdued, not meeting Sammy’s eye. The light had gone out of his. “Go home to Five and – I don’t know – do whatever it is you do when you’re not with me. Be miserable for the rest of your life.”

Sammy was upset enough that he actually listened, turning back around on his way out only to say “Ben – be careful. Please be careful.”

“Yeah,” Ben said as a farewell, looking at the floor, where all of his research was still strewn out around him. “Sure.”

* * *

 

The tension between them had been growing for a long time, ever since Lily Wright shook Ben’s hand at a gala held for the Victors earlier that year, in celebration of another addition to their ranks. His name was Finn, he was from District Two, he’d skewered three people with a sharp cattle prod to win.

It was the only time of year when all of the Victors were gathered in one place, the only time of year Sammy had to see Lily. They tended to pretend they didn’t know each other if they accidentally stumbled into one another at a different event, but here, everyone knew that Sammy and Lily had once been two parts of an inseparable trio.

“Lily Wright,” Lily extended an arm to Ben, but she was looking at Sammy. “I believe we met at this gala after you won your Games, but only very briefly.”

“Yeah!” Ben said, eyes going wide, enthusiastically wringing her hand. “I’m Ben Arnold! Well, I’m sure you already knew that.”

“And you must be Emily,” Lily reached her hand toward Emily as well.

“We talked last year,” Emily said politely as she took Lily’s hand, but her gaze flickered over to Sammy concernedly, probably because Sammy felt a bit like he was dying at these two parts of his life colliding like this. “It’s nice to see you again, Lily.”

“And…Sammy Stevens,” Lily’s smile didn’t reach her eyes as she stuck her hand between Ben and Emily to make it into Sammy’s. She squeezed too tightly. “It’s been awhile.”

“Oh, yeah, your Games were about the same time, right?” Ben said, not realizing the steady thrum of tension suddenly in their little group. Emily did, though, blinking up at Sammy as if to say that he had a friend here.

“He won the year after me,” Lily said, not betraying any emotion, not mentioned how they spent that first year clinging to each other like life rafts, especially because Jack’s Games had been the year after Sammy’s, and they’ d watched it all together. Lily had held Sammy’s hand through most of it, squeezing it tightly, just like now, except it was out of comfort, not hostility.

Sammy hadn’t even known Jack when he watched his Games. It was odd to think about, the idea of not knowing Jack. Sammy felt like life had begun when he met Jack most days, his own Games a distant and blurry memory.

“What did you all think of the Games this year?” Lily said in that silky smooth voice of hers that made it seem like she was just making small talk, but Sammy knew her better than that. “The cattle prod was creative, I have to say, but it wasn’t nearly as exciting of a finale as Ms. Potter here pushing Greg Frickard off a cliff face.”

A flush stained Emily’s cheeks and a surge of defensiveness rose in Sammy’s chest. Emily woke up screaming most nights because of it, she didn’t deserve to have Lily Wright of all people bring it up like it was a laughing matter.

“Oh, I don’t know, I think you betraying Vivian Cartwright and slitting her throat while she slept was much more entertaining,” Sammy said, his voice cold. Ben gaped at him, but Emily seemed to know what he was doing, her grimace at him a little more understanding.

Lily’s lip shook, just slightly. Vivian Cartwright had been thirteen, and trusted Lily to protect her. The guilt over it used to keep Lily up half the night. Probably still did.

“Well, nothing beats Shotgun Sammy,” Lily said, voice tight as could be. “Don’t you and that old shotgun still have the highest number of kills in any Game? I don’t think Finn beat you with that cattle prod of his, though he sure did try. How many is it again? Fourteen people?”

Sammy’s gut twisted unpleasantly. “Fifteen,” he said, but Lily already knew that, the smug look on her face proving it.

“Right,” Lily said, her smile fixed. “Well, either way, we all made it out the other side and get to enjoy a gala like this every fall. Lovely, isn’t it? Howard Beauregard was telling me all about the planning that went into it this year.”

“You know Mr. Beauregard?” Ben said, his voice growing a little suspicious.

Lily laughed unpleasantly. “Oh, I’m training to be a Gamemaker. I spend quite a bit of time with Howard and Judd.”

“Oh,” Ben said, and Sammy was relieved to hear the distrust filter through his voice. “That must be…interesting work.”

“The arenas really are works of art,” Lily said, her voice neutral as ever, never giving away a bit of what she really felt. “The two of you will have to stop by and see them sometime. I’m sure I can convince Howard that two young, bright Victors like yourselves should get to see where the magic really happens.”

“We’d love that, Ms. Wright,” Emily said, clearly trying to talk over whatever Ben was going to say, because Ben was the type of guy to start a heated debate in the middle of a gala and both Emily and Sammy knew that. “Thanks so much for the offer.”

“Sammy, you’re always welcome to join us,” Lily said, her voice making him sound distinctly unwelcome. Ben shot Sammy a questioning look like _who the hell is she?_ But Sammy would never have an answer to that question.

“Lily, have you met Ron Begley?” Sammy, as always, found a way to deflect as he caught Ron’s eye across the room and waved his friend and former mentor over to the conversation. Ron nodded in Sammy’s direction before side-stepping a drunk Cecil Sheffield to join in their little circle. “Ron, this is Lily Wright. Have you met before?”

“Course we have,” Ron said, shaking Lily’s hand anyway. “Back at your gala, Sammy. And then at Jack’s the year after. Don’t think I’ve seen her since, though.”

Lily and Sammy both froze at Jack’s name, but Ben didn’t.

“Oh man, Jack Wright,” Ben said with a short laugh. “I totally forgot about him. I thought about his Games so much during mine. Talk about winning with brains instead of brawn. Isn’t that what you even told me to do beforehand, Sammy?”

“Yep,” Sammy said, hoping his voice didn’t sound nearly as strangled as he felt. “Brains instead of brawn. Jack Wright could’ve gotten by with brawn if he had to, though. You really just had the one option.”

Ben shoved Sammy lightly, but Ron interrupted with a small frown on his face.

“What ever happened to Jack Wright?” Ron asked, eyes on Lily and not Sammy, because not even Ron knew what Jack had meant to him. “When you all were young, I’d see him all the time. Feels like I haven’t seen him in years.”

Lily and Sammy made eye contact without meaning to, or at least Sammy hadn’t meant to. For once, the look in both of their eyes was the same and they had a furious mental conversation about what Lily was going to say – of course, they both knew Sammy wouldn’t say a word no matter what, so it was her choice in the end.

“He died, actually,” Lily said, her voice properly subdued but not letting any real emotion filter out. Sammy knew it was there, but she’d never let strangers see it. “A few years ago – his health struggled for a long time after his Games, and he couldn’t cope with the survivor’s guilt. A real tragedy. I chose to keep it quiet, I didn’t want anyone to remember him just…for that.”

“I’m so sorry,” Emily said, Ben and Ron echoing the sentiment. “That’s horrible.”

Sammy didn’t say anything. Every word Lily said was a lie, and they both knew it.

“Losing family’s the worst thing,” Ron said. “Way worse than anything that happens in the Arena. My dad died a few years back and that hit me much harder than my Games.”

“Anyone want another drink?” Sammy said because he couldn’t bear to be a part of this conversation anymore. “Ben?”

Ben nodded at him, his eyes concerned, but he didn’t move to follow Sammy to the cocktails table, clearly wrapped up in whatever Lily said next.

But Sammy got out as fast as he could – his friends could hear about Jack, but he couldn’t stand the lies. Jack never would have killed himself, it was ridiculous to even think of that. Sammy and Lily, they were weak and flawed and hopeless, and could kill themselves at the drop of a hat, but not Jack. Jack had always been the strongest of the three of them, the brains and brawn and everything else, everything good.

Sammy was so lost in his thoughts that he didn’t realize the presence behind his shoulder until it was too late.

“Ah, Mr. Stevens,” a smooth, rich, and skin-crawling voice said in his ear, sending a tremor down his spine. “So glad I caught you tonight.”

“Judd Gunderson,” Sammy said, hunching his shoulders and taking a long swig of his drink before turning around to face the Head Gamemaker, who stood two inches taller than him in a regal and sleek black suit, the opposite to Grisham’s usual white. “What a pleasure.”

“I don’t see too much of you these days, Sam,” Gunderson said with that fixed and smug grin of his, like he perpetually had Sammy in a corner. Which, of course, he did. “You spend an awful lot of time in District Twelve these days.”

“Probably,” Sammy said, keeping his voice measured and neutral.

“Keeping on eye on Benjamin, I hope,” Gunderson remarked like it was a throwaway comment, but Sammy knew better. Gunderson’s eyes sidled over to Ben and watched him for a moment. “That boy’s trouble.”

“He’d be flattered to hear you say it,” Sammy said, practically biting his lip to keep from saying something even more biting or sarcastic.

“You’ll keep him on a leash,” Gunderson said without hesitation, a hand suddenly patting Sammy’s shoulder and making his skin itch. “Wouldn’t want him ending up like Mr. Wright, would we?”

Sammy didn’t answer. Couldn’t answer. But his silence was, as always, answer enough.

“Boy’s already caused enough trouble for the Capitol,” Gunderson with an idle cluck of his tongue. “We _don’t_ want any more, you got that, Stevens?”

Again, Sammy’s silence was the answer. Gunderson gave him once last smile before sidling off, presumably to go threaten one of the other Victors. “Knew I could count on you.”

Sammy downed the entirety of his drink at once, and hoped he wouldn’t remember that conversation in the morning.

* * *

 

The trouble Ben caused almost exclusively rested on his love for Emily. Sammy would never begrudge him for that – _could_ never begrudge him for that, because Sammy would’ve done the same thing if someone gave him a second chance at his life.

Emily’s Reaping had been a set-up. Sammy and Ben both knew it. Hell, even Emily knew it. It wasn’t a coincidence that the year after a Victor won without killing a single person, the girl he loved had her name drawn.

The Games didn’t just demand death – they demanded killing. Ben hadn’t killed a single person. But somehow, he still won.

That was the first time he’d angered the Capitol, and they’d gotten their revenge in the form of Emily’s name on a slip of paper.

Ben had been seventeen years old. It was his first year as a mentor and he’d already been panicking over having to guide two kids to their presumed deaths. But to have one of them been Emily was cruelty that didn’t happen by accident.

And Ben had practically killed himself to save her, pulling the kind of stunts that attracted the wrong kind of attention along the way. He’d exploited all of his connections, all of Sammy’s connections, all of Ron’s connections, everyone he possibly could to make sure Emily was beloved by the Capitol. He spread out posters, stickers, everything with her name on them. He’d peddled for donation after donation, and had gotten enough to send Emily everything she needed.

Sammy knew how to make an interesting Games, and that was how he’d helped. He knew the Capitol loved a rivalry, and they found one in the form of Greg Frickard, a truly awful sleaze from District One who had formed an unhealthy obsession with killing Emily from the beginning that Sammy and Ben fostered carefully in people’s minds.

The Gamemakers really did have no choice, in the end – they knew to get the maximum attention, it needed to be Greg and Emily in the end. And from there, it was up to Emily, and she’d done what she had to do to survive.

Emily survived her weeks in the Games better than Ben did; the guy had run himself into the ground, pleaded with everyone around him, practically groveling to the Gamemakers just for a chance to save Emily’s life.

“Get some sleep,” Sammy told him nearly every night, when they got into the wee hours of the morning. “Hell, Emily’s sleeping right now, so you should too, alright?”

“Someone could find her,” Ben said, eyes glued to his television set, the two of them alone after a day of meetings with anyone influential enough to give Ben the extra thousand coins he needed to get Emily a bow and arrow. She was best off if she could kill from a distance, and a sawed-off shotgun was a little too ubiquitous with Sammy to work for a second time. “I have to be here –”

“I’ll stay up,” Sammy said firmly. “You’ve done so much for her, Ben. She’s one of six left now. She’s got as good a chance as anyone of making it, if not more. You have to believe that, okay?”

“She might not, though,” Ben whispered, his body almost quaking. “But she has to. This has to work. She can’t be gone, not after everything –”

He looked up at Sammy almost pleadingly, begging him to say that it was all going to be okay.

Sammy was an honest guy to his core, but he couldn’t be honest here. The Games were a hellscape where the tables could turn in an instant without any warning.

He pulled Ben’s head against his shoulder instead of saying anything, letting Ben cry quietly against him.

“Hey, if you can make it, anyone can,” Sammy tried for joking, but Ben stilled against him, looking up with tearstained cheeks and a curious expression.

“You got me a map,” Ben said slowly. “A map of the whole arena. I’d nearly forgotten – but how? How’d you do that?”

“I can’t do it again, if that’s what you’re asking,” Sammy looked down, a lump in his throat at the memory. “I used up all of my favors on you.”

“Did you…” Ben blinked, his head tilting as his expression became unbearably tender. “Were you doing stuff like this? For me?”

“Yeah, I was your mentor, that was my job,” Sammy muttered to avoid the real topic of conversation here.

“But you didn’t have to be,” Ben said. “You’re not from Twelve – you volunteered to do it when there weren’t any Victors left from Twelve. Why’d you do that, anyway?”

“Ron convinced me,” Sammy said, and it was true enough. “Said that maybe it would give my life meaning or something, I don’t know.”

“Did it?” Ben half-smiled, his eyes bright.

“Yeah,” Sammy said with a little laugh, making himself meet Ben’s eyes.

Ben’s face split into a huge grin, the first smile Sammy had seen since Emily’s Reaping, and squeezed Sammy tightly.

“I love you,” Ben said into Sammy’s shoulder. “You’re the best friend I’ve ever had.”

Sammy was pretty sure that if he said anything, he was going to cry. But Ben deserved to hear it, especially right now, with the carnage around them, with the possibility of never seeing Emily again, he needed to hear something like that.

“I love you, too,” Sammy said, knowing he sounded a little too choked up, but he’d only ever told that to one person before, and that person was long gone and wasn’t coming back. “We’re gonna do this, alright? We’re gonna save Emily. Whatever you need, I’ve got your back.”

“I know you do,” Ben said, muffled into Sammy’s shirt. “You’ve had it ever since I met you – you barely knew me back then and you still did. I don’t think I’ve ever actually thanked you for that, not really.”

“No need,” Sammy said, swallowing his emotions down again. “You were never gonna make it on your own, you know, since you’re so tiny…”

“Shut up,” Ben half head-butted him and they laughed, just a little, before reality set back in around them.

* * *

 

Sammy didn’t think saving Ben was going to be possible once. He knew he had to try, and it wasn’t just because he was Ben’s mentor, it was because Ben was his friend and he didn’t want to lose him.

By the time Ben was halfway through his Games, hiding out in an underwater cave and getting by on one morsel of food a day, half-starving to death and delirious with only hours to go until someone found him and he couldn’t fight back, Sammy was already in too deep to let go and disengage.

He told himself – he fucking told himself not to get attached. But then Ben had to go and remind him of Jack to gain Sammy’s sympathy, and then be the best, purest, and most untainted by the horrors of the world person that Sammy had ever met, and Sammy couldn’t just let him die, not without a hell of a fight.

Ben hadn’t been the most popular tribute that year by any means, but he had a steady stream of support from the Capitol folks who thought he was sweet and funny, or at least didn’t want to see him die in a boring way, alone and without anyone to witness it.

The Capitol liked their fights, so Sammy was able to get him food and water if only so that he would be healthy enough to fight later on, but that wasn’t going to be enough. Because Ben wasn’t a fighter – a runner and hider, and could probably fight if necessary, but couldn’t kill with practiced ease.

“He’s no Shotgun Sammy,” Lily said when Sammy came to her office in the Capitol building the evening after getting Ben his food, ready to grovel for even a chance at her help. “Though I guess he’s a little Jack Wright, which is what you like about him.”

“He’s not Jack,” Sammy said a little too sharply, looking down at Lily in her desk that looked more like a throne. She’d flourished since Jack disappeared, and he didn’t know why, but he had his theories about that.

“No, he’s a little too cowardly for that, even if he is clever,” Lily said, barely looking up from her papers, and Sammy glared in response.

“Running and hiding isn’t cowardly, it’s smart,” Sammy said. “He’ll fight when the time comes.”

“Like Jack,” Lily said, because she just couldn’t let go of these things.

“Yes, like Jack,” Sammy snapped. “But I need your help.”

“The great and mighty Shotgun needs help from lowly Lily Wright?” Lily raised an elegant eyebrow.

Sammy snorted. “ _Lowly_? You’re a Gamemaker, Lily. We both know I’m the lowly one here.”

“Gamemaker in training,” Lily’s eyes flashed with annoyance. “Why are you here, anyway? You didn’t have to mentor this kid. You could’ve let someone else do it. So why you?”

Sammy gave her a long look, deciding how honest he was going to be. He looked around her large, spacious office bestowed to her by Judd Gunderson and Howard Beauregard and something snapped in his gut.

He’d always been an honest guy.

“Because after Jack disappeared, I broke down,” Sammy said, voice sharp but still measured. “My life felt meaningless. Still kind of does. Ron Begley found me in a drunken stupor told me that as rough as mentoring is, it gives his life meaning because he thinks that someday, he might be able to save just one person. And he saved me, and I gave his life meaning because he knew that he had a hand in keeping me alive. So maybe it would help me to save someone. When Dave died and they were looking for someone to fill in for Twelve, I volunteered. So I could have a chance to save someone.”

“It would probably make you feel less inept,” Lily said, her expression featureless. “Since you couldn’t save Jack.”

“Fuck you, Lily,” Sammy told her. “You’re playing lapdog to the people who took him, so don’t talk shit to me about not being able to save him.”

“Killed him, not took him,” Lily’s gaze turned steely and cold. “He’s dead. The sooner you accept that and face reality, the better. I loved my brother, but I don’t plan on making his mistakes, Stevens. Now get the fuck out of my office.”

“Not until you give me what I want,” Sammy said, because he’d spent a long time bending to whatever Lily wanted, but not anymore. Not when it came to Ben. “I need a map of the arena. I know you have one. I need a full map, with all of your little tricks marked clear as can be. Every cliff face, every crevice, every engineered monster you made this year. Everything. Down to the last goddamn detail.”

Lily wasn’t fazed, her expression neutral and unchanging. “And what do I get in return?”

“The fact that you know you’re helping a sixteen year old kid who doesn’t deserve to die?” Sammy tried, but knew that wasn’t enough, that he’d have to do something he didn’t want to. “I still have all of Jack’s possessions.”

The look on Lily’s face changed, just a single twitch, but it was enough – no matter what Lily’s intentions behind that desk were, she wanted Jack’s things. She was telling the truth – she still loved her brother.

Sammy hadn’t expected anything less of her. His opinion of Lily may have degraded significantly over the years, but he never doubted that she loved Jack.

“You’ll have to give me a couple of days,” Lily hedged, her eyes flickering to the doors. “Until Gunderson and goons have their guards down.”

“Okay,” Sammy said, relief flooding through him. “You get me the map, I let you take – take whatever you want of Jack’s.”

He half-expected Lily to say _I want all of it_ but Lily’s look in his direction was sadder than it was anything else.

“I hope the kid’s worth you having to swallow your pride,” Lily said, one of her lips twitching as if she was about to laugh. “We all know how much you hate doing that.”

Sammy didn’t say _of course he’s worth it_ even if that’s how he felt. Instead, he left Lily alone with her spacious office and her thoughts, whatever those thoughts might be.

* * *

 

Sammy knew he was going to help Ben from the beginning, because that’s what mentors did. His job was to help Ben and the girl who had been reaped the year, Olivia, in any way he could.

Dave Diamondback, the only living Victor from District Twelve, had died earlier that year, and up until the Reaping, no one had volunteered to take his place, figuring Twelve was a lost cause.

Ron said that lost causes sometimes needed the most help of all, and even though Sammy doubted that, he still did as Ron asked of him because he was desperate to feel anything, even if it was for two kids doomed to die.

Ben had been enthusiastic and overeager from the get-go, his innocence practically shining out of him, but never had Sammy felt so affected by it than when he found Ben on the rooftop the night after they arrived in the Capitol.

“Hey, sorry,” Ben said when he saw Sammy approaching, clambering up from where he’d been sitting next to the edge, looking down at the glimmering city. “I’ve just – I’ve never seen so many lights before.”

Sammy smiled weakly at him, gesturing for him to sit back down so Sammy could join him. Ben looked pleased, his already perpetual smile growing even wider, and how he could be smiling when he was about to be sent to his death was beyond Sammy’s understanding.

“They say that a week spent in this luxury is a gift,” Sammy said with a slight roll of his eyes. “One last hurrah, I guess, since…”

“You can say it,” Ben said, drawing his legs up to his chest, still smiling. “Since nearly all of us will be dead by this time next month.”

“Yeah,” Sammy said, a lump in his throat, thinking of the idea of Ben dying and hating Ron for suggesting mentoring to him. He wished he’d never met Ben, because he really did like the kid. Olivia was a nice girl, but she seemed at least a little capable, could handle a bow and arrow. Ben was tiny, barely five foot five, and had spent most of his training day learning how to identify edible plants.

Sammy wanted to protect him more than anything.

“I think I’ve made my peace with it,” Ben said, his smile dropping just a bit. “I know I’m not going to make it to the end, but – I’ll try my best. For my mom. I’m all she has. I want her to know that I tried.”

“You could make it,” Sammy said, trying the encouragement thing out. “You’ve got to go in thinking you have a chance.”

Ben shrugged. “Alright, I have a chance. But I’m not a fighter and I never will be. I’m squeamish and small for my age and have short legs. It’s not a winning combination.”

“The right circumstances play out, anyone can win,” Sammy said slowly, thinking back to his own Games. He rarely talked about those out loud. “I could’ve lost easily. Would have, too, if it hadn’t been for…”

“The shotgun,” Ben said with a sardonic twist of his lips. “Shotgun Sammy. You know, it’s kind of surprising that you’re not the cocky son of a bitch you always were on television. Well, I guess I’ll have to count on you to get me a gift like your shotgun.”

“You’ll be likable,” Sammy said, not mentioning that his asshole act was just that – an act. “Even if you can’t fight, you can still be charming in your interview. Maggie Masterson will eat you up – you’re adorable. And it helps that you look about twelve, too.”

“I’m sixteen!” Ben said, shoving a little at Sammy’s shoulder with a grin.

“I was sixteen for my Games,” Sammy said, a little stuck on the subject now. He didn’t let himself think about it too often. “Feels like forever ago.”

“C’mon, old man, you’re what? Twenty-five?” Ben asked.

“Twenty-six next month,” Sammy said, hating the thought of it. He should’ve died a long time ago, he was realizing now.

“I remember your Games really well for being as young as I was,” Ben said, resting his chin on his knee. “Yours and Jack Wright’s, those are the first two I remember. I remember thinking you were so scary – but you’re not, at least not anymore.”

“Thanks,” Sammy forced a laugh, his gut churning unpleasantly at the mention of Jack, but no one knew how close he and Jack had been, so he hardly expected anyone to notice his turmoil whenever Jack’s name came up. “I really wasn’t then, either. I was just a scared kid trying to survive, and then somehow I did. Still not sure how. I’m sure someone else deserved it more than me. Back then – I didn’t even have anyone who would’ve cared…”

Sammy stopped short, only just realizing how candid he was being with Ben. Ben blinked at him as if he was saying he could continue, but the words stuck in Sammy’s throat.

“It’s good you have your mom to come back to,” Sammy said instead. “Think about her, that’ll help get you through it, keep you going.”

“Yeah,” Ben said, staring out at the Capitol’s lights but his eyes seemed far away. “There’s this girl, too – her name’s Emily. We’ve been friends since we were kids. And I’ve always really loved her – like really, really loved her, not just puppy love. And when she came to me after the Reaping, she kissed me goodbye. Told me I needed to come back. So – so I’ll think about that. Whenever things get rough, I’ll just think that Emily Potter kissed me goodbye and wants me to come home.”

Sammy realized Ben was crying even though he still had that smile on, and Sammy thought for a second before hesitantly putting an arm around Ben’s shoulder and squeezing.

“That’s the only thing that makes this easier,” Sammy said quietly. “This whole thing is so fucking unfair – but thinking about the people you care about, who’ll notice when you’re not around anymore, that’s sometimes all there is. All that got me through my Games was knowing that Ron Begley was counting on me to come back. Told me he’d bring me back to life just to kill me himself if I made him watch me die. I thought about that a lot.”

“You gonna bring me back to life just to kill me, Sammy?” Ben said, his eyes a little more cheerful.

“Hopefully I won’t have to, ‘cause you’re gonna win,” Sammy knocked their knees together.

“Alright, I’m gonna win,” Ben smiled brilliantly at him and fuck, he reminded Sammy so much of Jack, just for that one instant, and then it was gone as Ben laughed and said “Alright, now go find Olivia and give her the same pep talk.”

“Nah,” Sammy shook his head. “I’ll give her a pep talk for sure. But I won’t give her this one.”

Ben grinned.

* * *

 

Ben didn’t remind Sammy at all of Jack the first time they met, in District Twelve, just after Ben’s Reaping. Sammy watched from the side of the stage, a sick feeling in his stomach as he surveyed the crowd of children in front of him. He hadn’t been physically present at one of these things since his own Reaping, which was no longer the worst day of his life.

It was ladies first, as always – Olivia DuPont was fifteen and acne-covered but she stuck her jaw out defiantly as she walked up onstage and didn’t shed a tear.

Then came the boys, and Sammy honest-to-God thought Ben Arnold couldn’t have been older than fourteen, he was so small, and there was a loud cry from the back that must have been his mother, God, hearing mothers cry was the worst part –

But Ben Arnold didn’t cry either, even though he looked terrified as all hell and stood half a head shorter than Olivia when they shook hands. Sammy saw them and thought neither of them had a chance in hell, and cursed Ron for talking him into this.

He didn’t get to talk to them until they were on the train to the Capitol, and he bumped into Ben in the hallway before his actual formal meeting time with both of the tributes.

“Sorry, I –” Ben looked up, his eyes red like he’d been crying. “Oh. Wow. Are you – wow. Are you Shotgun Sammy?”

Sammy bit his lip, hating the name as much as he had the day some christened him Shotgun. “Sammy Stevens,” he said, reaching out a hand to shake, which Ben did. “I’m gonna be your mentor.”

“Really?” Ben’s eyes widened. “Oh, shit. I knew Dave had died this year and that we were going to get someone from another district – but damn, Shotgun Sammy. You’re kind of a legend, man. Sometimes the kids at my school would pretend to be you with your sawed-off shotgun when they played in the schoolyard.”

“But not you?” Sammy asked, the thought unnerving him. He wasn’t someone anyone should idolize, let alone little kids.

Ben grimaced, looking at the ground. “Uh, no. I always knew the Games were nothing to be taken lightly. My mom taught be well enough for that.”

“Good,” Sammy said with a small nod. They both fell silent for a moment, obviously uncomfortable in each other’s presence. Because Sammy dealt with discomfort mainly through snarkiness, he said “I was glad to hear you were sixteen. I thought a poor twelve year-old kid had been reaped.”

 “Oh, fuck off,” Ben said, but he laughed. How anyone could laugh right now was hard for Sammy to grasp, but it sounded genuine. “I’m not that tiny.”

“You are a little bit,” Sammy said, hiding his own grin.

“Hey, it’s the Hunger Games, the bulky guys will have a bigger adjustment,” Ben said. “I’m used to going hungry. District Twelve’s one advantage, I guess.”

“Well, I’ll try my best to make sure District Twelve has a Victor this year,” Sammy said because it sounded like something a proper mentor person would say. “I was just going to the dining area to meet with you and Olivia…do you wanna…”

“Yeah,” Ben said with a nod, following Sammy down the corridor. “Glad that we’ve got someone here to help us out. I wouldn’t have been surprised if the Capitol left Twelve out in the dark without even someone to have our backs.”

“Well, I will,” Sammy said, and tried to mean it. Maybe this really could give his life meaning, somehow. He could make this give his life meaning.

* * *

 

Nearly three years later to the day, Sammy was at another Reaping, corralled together with the other ten former Victors of District Five, awaiting Burt Reynolds to read out the Quarter Quell tributes with a pit of something in his stomach. Not dread. No. This was different.

At least there would be no kids this year, Sammy thought wearily to himself. Twenty-four more kids would make it to adulthood than would have before. That was something. Wasn’t it?

Districts One through Four had already been reaped. Rose and Archie from One – God, Sammy had always liked both of them. Rose was already the favorite to win. Larry and Reagan from Two – Larry was a nice guy, Reagan was tough competition. Pete and Riley from Three – Sammy didn’t like either of them, especially Pete, but they still didn’t deserve this.

He’d been nervous about Four, but of course Lily wasn’t drawn. She was a Gamemaker. She’d been within the group of Victors waiting, presumably to keep up appearances, but she’d probably planned the arena they were all in. And even though he knew Jack wasn’t there, Sammy still looked for his face in the crowd of Victors.

Four was Pippa, a good friend of Lily’s that Sammy didn’t know well, and Dan, who Sammy had never liked. It didn’t make it any easier to hear their names called, though.

No one had volunteered yet. They’d all been Reaped, and gone forward with grim faces and determined glints in their eye saying if they did this once, they could do it again.

“You nervous?” Ron bumped shoulders with him as they waited. Burt and Maggie were both up onstage, but the microphones were still being set up, two large glass bowls on either side, even as the crowd grew antsier around them.

“Nah,” Sammy said, though his heart was in his throat. It wasn’t nerves, though – not about this, at least.

“Well, there’s seven of us,” Ron said with a heavy sigh. “And four women. They have the worse odds.”

Sammy didn’t say that Ron had no need to worry about the odds. But whatever he said, Ron could see through to the truth, so Sammy shut up and didn’t say anything at all, letting Ron think it was because he was anxious.

“Welcome,” Maggie Masterson greeted the crowd with a couple of taps on the microphone. “To the Quarter Quell. We’ll get right down to business.”

Maggie had a dark look in her eye. Burt had been his enthusiastic self at the Reapings, but Maggie hadn’t. Sammy figured it was because Maggie knew the Victors a little too well to be fully on board with this.

“Ladies first,” Burt said, laughingly jovial, and fished around the four names for a moment. Sammy’s heart beat faster as he thought about the women standing on either side of him. “Janice Finkle.”

Sammy’s heart sank as Janice stumbled up to the stage. Janice was Ben’s age, a sweet kid, who had only won six years ago. He gave the other three women a look – they were all much older than Janice, surely one them would – but no, no, it was Janice, she pushed her glasses up as she stood on the stage with her lip quivering but eyes hard as she shook Burt’s hand.

“And now for the gents,” Maggie said, casting an apologetic look in their direction as she reached into the bowl. Sammy swallowed the lump in his throat. “…Ron Begley.”

Sammy felt Ron deflate next to him, but didn’t give him more than a second to think about it before he stepped in front of Ron before he could walk up to the stage.

“I volunteer as tribute,” Sammy said, keeping his voice as even and loud as possible. Maggie’s eyes widened as she stared at him. A series of gasps went through the crowd and Ron pulled Sammy back by the scruff his neck.

“The hell you think you’re doing?” Ron said, practically shaking, hitting Sammy upside the back of the head.

“I would’ve done it no matter who it was,” Sammy said, smiling at one of his oldest friends. “It’s an added bonus that I got to do it for you.”

“Ben’s gonna be furious with you,” Ron told him, immediately knowing exactly what Sammy’s train of thought was – the train that mainly went _keep Ben safe_ and stopped there.

“I expect nothing less – but I’m hoping you’ll come to the Capitol with me and be my mentor,” Sammy said. “I’ll need someone on this side pulling the strings for Ben and Emily, and I can’t do it this time around.”

He didn’t give Ron a chance to argue and headed up to the stage with the swagger of Shotgun Sammy, who kept coming back to haunt him all these years later – but Sammy needed that guy now, all of his faked cockiness and arrogance, all of his tenacity and ability, because that was the only way Ben Arnold and Emily Potter were making it out of this alive.

District Twelve would have one name in each glass jar. There was no gray area for what would happen there. 

Sammy had been ready to die anyway. Now at least he got to die to save the people he loved. He missed his chance with Jack – but he could still do it for Ben. Maybe his life could still be worth something in the end.


	2. Everyone's Watching, Everyone's Curious, Everyone's Holding Their Breath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hurried to finish this weekend, since my work week is exhausting as all hell and I don't write during it. I'll have the final part up sometime before the end of next weekend, so watch out for it! I am here to write even more hacky angst. I also have a bunch of handwritten papers with complicated timelines on them for absolutely no reason other than that I love keeping the timelines straight.
> 
> Also, didn't mention this before, but the title and all chapter titles come from Richard Siken's Planet of Love. Everything Siken's ever written does in fact make me super emo about Sammy Stevens, so here we are. Hope you like the second part!

The first time Sammy saw Ben after his Reaping, Ben punched him in the face.

Well, he tried to, anyway. Sammy had about eight inches on Ben, so it was more like a punch to the lower side of his jaw, but it still hurt like hell.

“Ow, what the fuck?” Sammy swatted at Ben’s shoulder as Ben glowered up at him. Behind his mask of anger, Sammy could see the tears forming behind his eyes. “I was just coming to see you, asshole.”

“Yeah, well, I was just coming to see you,” Ben said, blinking rapidly. “And yell at you. I can’t believe you volunteered.”

Sammy bit his lip, looking out the train compartment window. They were in a corridor between cars right now – Sammy had been making his way back to District Twelve’s compartment and hopping through, but Ben had beat him to the punch and now they were standing in the corridor between District Nine and Ten’s, the countryside flashing by next to them, taking all of them to the Capitol for the very last time.

“I did something that wasn’t expected of me,” Sammy tried to gain a little sympathy with a weak laugh. “Thought you’d be pleased.”

“Fuck you,” Ben said, but there was no punch behind him, just wide, concerned eyes. “You did _not_ volunteer for the fucking Hunger Games just to win an argument with me. I mean, I wouldn’t put it past you by any means, because you’re such a petty piece of shit.”

“Well then, _you_ did _not_ just punch me in the goddamn jaw for volunteering!” Sammy said, rubbing the side of his face, which was now tender to the touch. “It’s gonna bruise, Ben! Maggie Masterson is gonna ask me about it live on television and I’m gonna have to say that my best friend punched me in the face! How’s that gonna look for me?”

“Pretty in character, _Shotgun_ ,” Ben said with a roll of his eyes.

“Don’t remind me,” Sammy muttered, feeling a little sick to his stomach. “I’ll be better off in the Games than trying to win over Maggie and Burt. I hate being interviewed on TV.”

“Maybe you should’ve thought of it before you goddamn volunteered,” Ben’s voice got extremely high, and his anger seemed to be melting away and into genuine panic, which was somehow worse. “How could you do that, Sammy? How?”

“Ben,” Sammy said, feeling as emotionally clumsy as he ever had in his life. “I – I’m just trying to keep you safe.”

“That’s what I was afraid of,” Ben said, looking down at the train’s floor, and Sammy knew he was trying to hide his tears. “See, at first I thought it was for Ron, and I almost understood. Almost. But then I thought about it for a minute, and realized that you were calm, you were ready, you had planned it. And then I couldn’t figure out why – but then I thought maybe, maybe you did it out of some misguided attempt to protect me. And then I was like no, Sammy’s not that stupid! But then I remembered who you were as a person and I’m pretty sure you are that goddamn stupid.”

“It’s not misguided,” Sammy started, and Ben looked up to glare at him again, but his eyes were ringed red and he was sniffling. “You were going to be Reaped no matter what. How could I not volunteer? How could I not do everything I can to keep you safe? You’re – I can’t live without you, Ben. You can’t expect me to live without you.”

Sammy noticed the tears on his cheeks about a second after a furious mental battle seemed to take place on Ben’s face before he threw his arms around Sammy’s shoulders and started crying against his chest.

They didn’t talk for a few seconds; Sammy just let Ben sob against him. Sammy rested his chin on top of Ben’s head and tried to communicate, somehow, that he was so sorry, that he wished that anything else could’ve happened but this.

“You could’ve been my mentor again,” Ben said after a few moments, not letting go of Sammy. “That’s – that’s the only thing that was getting me through. The idea of Emily and I – together in that awful place, knowing that we both couldn’t live – the only thing that got me through was the idea of you pulling the strings on the other side. That’s the only reason I survived in the first place – the only reason Emily survived. How the hell –”

“Ron’s here, Ron will help that way,” Sammy said into Ben’s hair. “I’m here to take the bullets this time around.”

“Shut up,” Ben said, letting go of Sammy, anger filtering back into his voice as he glared up at him, fiery-eyed. “Don’t talk about that. It’s bad enough thinking that both Emily and I can’t – but with you here too, God, how are we going to – honestly, Sammy, why the hell did you volunteer to keep _me_ safe? You know I’ll die for Emily as soon as I have the chance.”

“And I’ll die for either of you as soon as _I_ get the chance,” Sammy volleyed back, pretending he was annoyed instead of bursting with deep affection for Ben. “Like I said. I’m not living without you.”

“I love you,” Ben said, his eyes unreadable but his voice wavering. “I can’t believe you did this and I absolutely hate you for it, but I love you and since we’ll both be dead soon anyway, I forgive you. But that’s the only reason.”

“Don’t say that,” Sammy said, tasting lead in his mouth. “Would it make you feel better if you could actually punch me in the face? I can sit down or something. So that you can – well. Reach.”

He and Ben looked at each other for a few seconds before Ben finally cracked a smile and they both started laughing, weak and not altogether there, but Ben leaned in to hug him again.

“Are we still arguing?” Sammy said, squeezing Ben tightly so as not to look at him. “About…about Thirteen?”

“No,” Ben sighed against Sammy’s shoulder. “I guess it doesn’t really matter anymore. I guess – I guess _nothing_ matters anymore.”

Sammy felt a lump in his throat that made it difficult to swallow. “I have a plan.”

“Do you?” Ben said, his voice not wavering, the absolute trust and faith he had in Sammy clear even from those two words, and it scared the hell out of Sammy,

“Well, I think Ron does,” Sammy muttered, forcing a laugh. “We can figure it out from there. You and Emily want to come down to our compartment in an hour? I promise I’ll be sitting then, so you can punch me again if you feel like it.”

Ben laughed, and he reminded Sammy of the kid he’d met three years ago who could laugh in the face of anything. He tried to internalize that, remember the sound, just in case his plan didn’t work and Ben was the first to go.

* * *

 

Ben didn’t punch Sammy in the face when they met in District Five’s compartment, but Emily Potter slapped him the moment she saw him, her jaw set in the same way Ben’s got sometimes when he was being particularly stubborn and angry.

“Ow!” Sammy yelped, the stinging of his jaw deeply unpleasant as he rubbed a hand over the sore spot that was almost certainly going to turn purple by morning. “And right where Ben punched me, too? I’m being unfairly victimized.”

“I can’t believe you,” Emily stared down at him, her lip quivering, a few strands of dark hair fell out of her ponytail and into her face as her body almost shook. “I can’t _believe_ you.”

“That’s so smart,” Ben said, patting the back of Emily’s shoulder. “I should’ve slapped him instead of going in for the punch. It would’ve been a lot less embarrassing that way.”

Emily ignored her boyfriend, the fury in her eyes only for Sammy, which was far more terrifying than Ben’s anger because Emily might actually hold a grudge where Ben was incapable of staying mad for too long.

“It’s bad enough that this Games is full of our friends, that we’re expected to kill our friends,” Emily said, her voice quaking with the effort. “But to have you here, Sammy? I couldn’t bear to lose you.”

“Then maybe you can understand why I volunteered,” Sammy said slowly, because even though Emily was likelier to stay angry, she was also more easily prone to see reason than Ben. “Because I couldn’t bear to lose you. Either of you.”

“Well, all three of you will probably be dead soon anyway,” Janice Finkle interrupted from the other side of the table, where she had her knees drawn up to her chest and was looking at all three of them who were on the brink of tears with judgment in her eyes. “What? Rose from District One is a shoe-in. Either her or Herschel Baumgartner. None of you are strong enough to take _them_ out.”

“Nice to see you again, Janice,” Ben said, reaching out to shake her hand with a half-smile, half-grimace. “I was really sorry to hear you’d been Reaped.”

Janice shrugged, her face expressionless. “Yeah. I felt bad for you two, since there was no possible way out for you. But hey, I think I was kind of expecting this. There was no way Grisham was gonna let the Victors get away with anything just because we already won once. We’ve all still got time to do, in the Capitol’s eyes. I just figure we can all go out with a giant fuck you to them if we try hard enough.”

“Truer words never spoken, Janice,” Ron said as he entered the little compartment, his voice tired and dark circles under his eyes, but he grinned when Ben practically tackled him into a hug. “Hey, Benny. Hey, Emily. Good to see you, too.”

Emily stopped glaring at Sammy long enough to let Ron envelope her in a hug, and Sammy rose to his feet and reached an arm out as well when she was done. Her glare melted, just a little bit, and Sammy did his best to give her a winning smile.

“Only because Benny already forgave you,” Emily said stiffly, but her hug was genuine as she molded around him, squeezing him so tightly he couldn’t breathe.

“Let’s break up the love fest,” Ron said with a wave of his hand, “and get down to business. Now technically, I’m here to mentor Janice and Sammy and make sure one of them wins. But I know perfectly well that Sammy isn’t trying to win, and his goal is only to keep Ben and Emily safe, so I’m also here to keep Ben and Emily safe. Just don’t tell anyone from the other Districts that I’m helping out.”

“I won’t tell anyone – but you’re all including me in your little group,” Janice said with a nod at Sammy. “I know where my best chance of survival is, and it’s not alone.”

Sammy held in a sigh; it wasn’t that he didn’t like Janice or didn’t want to help her, but keeping Ben and Emily safe would be hard enough on their own, let alone letting her tag along and distract him. But Ron was giving him a look, and Sammy was a decent and moral guy.

“Obviously you’re in the group, Janice,” Sammy said. “We can adapt the plan for whatever.”

“What plan’s this?” Ron’s eyes flickered up at him questioningly.

Sammy shrugged. “Your plan. You’ve been doing this longer than the rest of us combined, Ron, I’m sure you have a plan.”

Ron let out a low whistle. “Never seen a Games like this one, though. It’s gonna get real interesting. But I’ll do my best to make you all last as long as you can. I can act on all your behalfs to turn out money in the Capitol, but none of you are heavy-hitters. Ben and Emily will get some attention for being our Romeo and Juliet, and of course everyone remembers Shotgun Sammy. But with Victors with such a huge Capitol presence like Rose and Archie, or those who’ve been around for decades like Herschel and Cecil, or even those well-remembered, well-liked folks like Troy and Mary – there’s a shit ton of options, and they’ve all got attachments here. It’s gonna be a hell of a Games.”

“What would you put our odds at?” Ben asked, biting his lip, his hand reaching for Emily’s, who squeezed it tightly in her own.

Ron shrugged. “Depends on the outcome you want. Odds of you winning, Benny? Not high. You’ve never killed a soul before. But with Sammy there with you…that’ll change things. Odds of Emily winning? If she can do what she did to Frickard to half a dozen of these clowns, she might make it to the top ten. Janice? It all depends on if you can get a decent weapon. And Sammy…”

Ron’s shoulders dropped as he looked into Sammy’s eyes like he saw straight through every bit of bravado Sammy ever tried to act like he had. “If you were _trying_ to win, I’d say you could make it to the last seven before Reagan Spears took your head as a trophy. But I know what you’re here for, and it ain’t for winning. So unless anything changes? There’s no chance of you making it out alive.”

Sammy met Ron’s eye unflinchingly. “Count on it.”

* * *

 

Sammy didn’t get another chance to see Ben and Emily until the opening ceremonies. He’d been poked and prodded at by a stylist for a few hours beforehand and told repeatedly that he wasn’t taking well enough care of himself, which Sammy had known for years already and either Ron or Ben told him at least once a week.

He used to do an alright job of it, back when Jack had still been around, but those few months between Jack disappearing and meeting Ben, Sammy had been slipping in and out of consciousness for most of it, and definitely not thinking about needs like eating and sleeping.

If Jack was here, if he’d been District Four’s tribute for the Quarter Quell, he would’ve been a favorite to win. Everyone had loved Jack in a way they hadn’t loved Lily or Sammy during their Games – Lily was beautiful and vindictive, Sammy was violent and unpredictable, but Jack – Jack had been charming and dangerous, and that was the Capitol’s favorite combination.

None of the other Victors that Sammy saw circling their chariots had that, laughing and chatting with one another like this was the yearly gala greeting another member into their ranks and not days before twenty-four of the most dangerous and traumatized people in the twelve districts would return to their nightmare and murder each other, none of them had that surefire combination of handsome charm with a bit of an edge like Jack Wright had.

Jack could win the Quell if he was here. Lily could win it, too, if she had volunteered in Pippa’s place. But Sammy couldn’t. Even if he tried, he couldn’t. He knew perfectly well that Ron was right – that he’d make it close to the end, but wouldn’t be there for the final act.

It was all beside the point anyway. All Sammy cared about was making sure that Ben and Emily made it to that last act. If he could get them there, then he could die fulfilled.

Janice had left their chariot a while ago to go socialize Riley Bevins, who won two years before she did. Ben and Emily still hadn’t shown up – they were District Twelve, they’d be the last on the scene – so Sammy decided that he might as well go and talk to some old friends and new competition.

Sammy didn’t want any of these people to die – oh, alright, maybe he wouldn’t shed any tears over Pete Meyers – but he was going to have to push his feelings aside because Ben and Emily were far more important to him than anyone else.

“Nice costume, Stevens,” Herschel Baumgartner said snidely but with a smile on his face as Sammy approached him with a wave and a half-grimace. “What the hell are you supposed to be?”

“A bolt of lightning, I think?” Sammy said with a shrug, itching at the black and yellow stretchy material over his chest. District Five was electricity and somehow all of their tributes ended up dressed like a bolt of lightning at some point or another. “And you’re one to talk – what are you?”

“A cow, obviously, can’t you see my spots?” Herschel reached around his neck to pull up a fake snout. “Moo, moo, Stevens.”

Sammy couldn’t help but laugh. God, the designers never got any better at their jobs. “Where’s Cecil?”

“Off with Esther Rawlins,” Herschel said with a disgusted wave of his hand. “Playing lovey-dovey birds or what have you. I don’t know if he realizes that she’s gonna be dead soon – well, he’ll probably die before her, he’ll fall down drunk in the first ten minutes and never get back up again.”

Herschel started off sounding like his usual angry and bitter self, but he sighed almost wistfully as he stared across the arena to the chariot where Cecil Sheffield stood talking animatedly with Esther Rawlins.

Herschel, Cecil, and Esther were the oldest tributes here, but Herschel was the most legendary, remembered for a particular duel he’d had with three other guys who had ganged up against him and he’d killed them all. That had been about fifty years ago now, if not more, though.

Herschel was also the only Victor who had volunteered other than Sammy, so he supposed there was a bit of a kinship between them there.

Herschel seemed to recognize that, too, for the next thing he said was “You’re here for that Ben Arnold fellow, yes? You volunteered because you knew he’d be here.”

“Yeah,” Sammy said, because it wasn’t worth it to lie to Herschel, he’d just cuss at him until Sammy told the truth. “Why’d you do volunteer?”

Herschel nodded in Cecil and Esther’s direction. “Had to keep an eye on those two, didn’t I?”

Sammy felt something twist deep in his gut as he recognized that the similarities between himself and Herschel ran a little too deep, that if the world had let him live to old age, he’d probably be just like Herschel, just with a little less cursing.

He didn’t have time to think about, however, since a moment later Herschel asked “You notice how many young people are here?”

Sammy blinked curiously up at him, not knowing what he was getting at. “Yeah? I guess?”

“I think it’s a set-up,” Herschel said with a vigorous nod. “Most of us old folks don’t hold any danger to the Capitol no more. But you young folks, you have a chance to topple them. And they can’t have that, so they need you dead before you can start any sort of uprising.”

“There are a lot more young people,” Sammy said slowly, surveying the crowd around him. The last fifteen years were disproportionately represented – obviously the Wrights weren’t here, but Sammy was, Janie and Riley were, Reagan Spears and Troy Krieghauser, Larry, Dan, Pete, and of course Ben and Emily. That was two thirds. Meanwhile, Herschel was the oldest person here by a long ways, only Cecil and Esther came close, but Chet was at least ten years younger than Esther at the next-oldest…

“I wouldn’t put it past Grisham to rig it like that,” Sammy acknowledged, and Herschel just snorted.

“Grisham’s a puppet – it’s Beauregard and Gunderson who are really pulling the fucking strings here,” he said with a roll of his eyes.

The trumpets sounded around them, cuing that everyone needed to return to their chariots. Sammy looked around again for Ben and Emily, but didn’t see them yet, even though District Twelve’s chariot had rolled in a moment ago. They must be nearby, probably talking to Mary or someone who would want to see them.

“Get going,” Herschel waved him off. “Have fun lighting up like a fucking Christmas tree while I moo and bray and try to eat some fucking grass. We’ll see you in training tomorrow and see how cocky you are without that shotgun of yours.”

Sammy was going to head back to his chariot right away, but finally caught a glimpse of Ben and Emily standing at the mercy of Cynthia Higgenbaum towering over the two of them between Twelve and Eleven’s chariots.

“And then I said there was absolutely no way I was heading back to the Arena if that horrible Chet Sebastian was going to be the only other representation from District Nine – but then I realized that no, no, I had to represent District Nine or else he’d be the only one. That’s the only reason I was able to leave my kids – Chad and Brad, have you met Chad and Brad – I hate leaving them with their dad, awful man, almost as bad as Chet, but I knew I had to –”

“Hi, Cynthia,” Sammy loudly interrupted from behind her. “Isn’t it time to be getting back to your chariot?”

Cynthia turned to face him, her nose wrinkling. Sammy wouldn’t waste any tears on Cynthia’s fate either, though that was more out of annoyance with her than anything else. She’d coped with the trauma of her Games by causing everyone who spoke to her an amount of mini-trauma that could be created only through holding a conversation with her for more than two minutes.

“Shotgun,” Cynthia glared up at him. “Back in the arena again where you belong, I see. I’m sure you’ve just been itching to get to take us all out. You’ve got that look in your eye like your seconds from snapping all the time, and if you only had that shotgun you’d open fire on us all any second.”

Sammy tried not to laugh at the face Ben was making behind Cynthia’s back and instead schooled his face to his most serious expression. “Cynthia, I would never.”

Cynthia sniffed at him. “Oh, you’re just itching to, I can tell. I hope to God that no one puts a shotgun in that arena. Well, I have to get back to _Chet_ , unfortunately. Oh, good luck, Benny, I’m sure the Capitol will just eat you up! Goodbye, _Ms_. Potter. Shotgun.”

Cynthia flounced off and Sammy turned to make eye contact with Emily, who was hiding the same smile as him as Ben blushed bright red.

“I see Cynthia is still in love with you,” Emily said at the same time as Sammy said “So how _does_ it feel to have a woman twice your age flirt shamelessly with you days before you’re going to try to brutally murder one another?”

Ben turned a previously unknown shade of red and muttered something unintelligible before saying “I can’t help that people fall in love with me! I’m lovable! It’s a gift!”

Emily laughed but Sammy leaned in closer to as not to be overheard to say “Herschel just told me something about how many young people are here as opposed to –”

There was another loud trumpet, and Sammy caught sight of Janice from their chariot motioning furiously at him.

“Tell us later!” Ben said as he and Emily headed back over toward Twelve, leaving Sammy to jog back up to Five past the long row of chariots waiting to greet the Capitol – for most of them, for the last time.

But everyone here knew how the Capitol worked, had intimate knowledge of its inner operations, and knew that they couldn’t pull any punches. Sammy had won the Games thirteen years ago, but that was small dice compared to most of these Victors. They’d been here for decades.

And Ben and Emily had only been here for a few years, barely had enough connections to scramble together alliances – but that was alright. That was why Sammy was here. To make sure they had everything they needed.

“Hey, Sammy!” Troy Krieghauser greeted Sammy from the chariot behind him as he finally caught up to Janice, swinging himself onto it. Troy was a sweet guy, about five years younger than Sammy, but much taller, broader, and better at fighting people. He was also much kinder and gentler than any Victor had any right to be.

“Hey Troy,” Sammy swung around to shake hands with his friend. “Nice…costume? What is it supposed to be?”

“A railroad,” Troy said with a long-suffering sigh. He was wearing an entirely metal suit that must be endlessly uncomfortable, that left half of his chest bare. Oh, well, Sammy supposed that chests like Troy’s were usually taken advantage of by stylists.

“I’m a train,” Pearl Williams deadpanned from next to Troy, where she was similarly half-naked and dressed in red boxes where Sammy could see through to parts of her body he didn’t want to see. “District Six really is the worst.”

“Herschel’s dressed like a cow,” Sammy pointed out, which made them both laugh. “He told me he’d see me in training tomorrow, which sounds kind of like a threat.”

Troy grinned. “Oh, I’ll keep him away from you. I’ll train with you in the morning, Sammy. We’ve all gotta show off our skills, after all, make sure everyone knows who’s still viable. Not that Herschel ain’t viable – he’s the favorite to win after Rose is what I’ve heard.”

“Well, I look forward to training with you and watching Herschel wow us all with his skills all these years later,” Sammy said, laughing, but he was cut off suddenly by the third trumpet.

“Good luck,” Troy whispered as Sammy turned to face the large double doors that went out into the Capitol – the last time he’d ever face them all. The last week of his life outside the Arena.

He reached down in his chest to feel something, anything – and found that he wasn’t afraid. Not of this. Not anymore.

* * *

 

His feeling the next morning when Troy slams him into the ground after only forty seconds of not even kind-of wrestling isn’t _fear_ per se, but it’s definitely nothing good.

“Shit, Sammy, I’m sorry,” Troy blinked over at him anxiously as one of the medics handed Sammy an ice pack that he applied to the side of his jaw with a hiss as he stumbled away from the wrestling mats to sink low on the floor. “I didn’t mean –”

“You really are useless without that shotgun, huh?” Ben said as he sauntered over to Sammy, Emily in tow, Ben concealing a smile while Emily looked concerned.

“You really are useless in general, huh?” Sammy sniped back. “Have fun learning about edible plants?”

“I needed a refresher course,” Ben said with a charming and unashamed grin. “And, as you can recall, knowing what seaweed to eat probably saved my life in my Games.”

“Well, I definitely saved your life, so don’t talk back to me,” Sammy half-heartedly kicked in the general direction of Ben’s legs. “Plus, I’m off my game since _you_ already bruised my jaw before training even started.”

“You did that, Benny?” Troy knelt down next to Sammy to tilt his head, giving the bruise a good long look. “What the hell was that for?”

“Did I just hear that Ben Arnold gave Shotgun that bruise?” A voice asked from behind Troy and Archie Simmons wandered up with a pleased-looking grin. “I didn’t think you had it in you, Benny.”

Ben blushed under the attention. “I didn’t _mean_ to –”

“Oh, you absolutely did _mean_ to!”

“Well, you probably deserved it,” Mary Lowing walked up behind Archie and put an arm around Ben’s shoulder. She’d always liked Ben, treated him like a kid brother. Archie just kindly bullied everyone around him, but especially Ben, because Ben was easy to bully. Sammy understood that. “Ben’s too sweet to punch you for no reason.”

“Emily slapped him!” Ben said, presumably to detract attention from himself, and Emily turned pink as Archie, Mary, and Troy all turned to her in shock. They were attracting a fair bit of attention from the rest of the room now too, which made Sammy want to crawl inside of himself in embarrassment.

“Did you?” Archie grinned, clearly delighted.

“Well, slapping doesn’t leave a bruise, so it’s better,” Emily tried to justify herself but Troy just gaped at her.

“You mean you _did_ slap him? Why?”

“Because I’m an asshole and deserved it,” Sammy said, interrupted everyone’s fun as he swung himself up on his feet, leaving his ice pack sitting on the ground. “Now if you’ll _excuse_ me, I’m going to go identify edible plants like an _adult_ if anyone wants to join me.”

He stalked away, giving Ben and Emily a meaningful look he was sure they understood.

The two of them joined him a moment later, leaving Troy, Mary, and Archie to their gossip circle – well, any circle that had Archie in it automatically became a gossip circle – and the three of them sat cross-legged on the floor together among plant samples, a good twenty feet from any of the other Victors.

“Sorry about your jaw,” Ben had the decency to look embarrassed, touching the side of Sammy’s face lightly.

“It’s alright,” Sammy said. “Looks better, actually, to have some friction between us. I mean, people like Troy and Mary will never be fooled but idiots like Larry and Dan might buy into it. They’ll think I’m more of a threat if I actually –”

He broke off, and Ben didn’t finish his thought, even though he and Emily both clearly knew how that sentence ended.

“Well, we should talk alliances,” Emily said with a steadfast glint in her eye. “I’ve heard that Archie and Sheila are teaming up, to no one’s surprise, and so are Reagan and Riley.”

“I’d assume Herschel, Cecil, and Esther aren’t going to leave each other,” Sammy said quietly, his eyes following Herschel across the room from where he stood arguing with Cecil about fishing lures. “And Dan and Larry have always been tight-knit.”

“We should try to get someone at least a little dangerous on our side, like Rose,” Ben mused out loud and Sammy gave him a look.

“I don’t think we need anyone else,” Sammy said slowly. “We already have Janice plus the three of us. That’s already a big group.”

“Yeah, but _you’re_ the most dangerous among us,” Ben said with a roll of his eyes, “and I don’t know if you saw that fight with Troy, dude, but that’s not saying much. We should at least get Troy on our team – and he’d be happy to. He likes us.”

“I guess you’re right,” Sammy allowed, watching Troy lift a large weight with ease from where he stood with Archie. “Alright, we’ll ask Troy. But that’s it.”

“Oh,” Emily said with a frown. “I thought maybe we could recruit Mary and Tim as well.”

Sammy blinked at her a couple of times while Ben said, “Oh, that’s a great idea!”

“Mary, maybe,” Sammy admitted with a suspicious frown. “She’s got a good reputation. But Tim? Tim Jensen? He’s been in bad health for years.”

He felt awful even saying it, but it was true. Tim Jensen and been in and out of health since his Games, and that was longer ago than Sammy’s. The fact that he was here at all was horrible, but he was the only male Victor from District Eleven so no one could volunteer in his place.

“We couldn’t get Mary without Tim,” Emily said, and then hushed her voice several levels to say “They’re engaged. Secretly, of course. They didn’t want anyone in the Capitol to know and hold it against them. Which ended up being a really smart idea. Because Mary’s the only female Victor from Eight and Tim’s the only male Victor from Eleven…well, they had no choice but to be here. Just like –”

Emily and Ben shared a long, lovelorn look, but all Sammy could think about as his stomach churned was Jack, that ring that was in his house in Five that he’d locked away in his safe years ago because he couldn’t stand to even look at it without Jack there with him.

“So Tim and Mary?” Ben said after a long clearing of his throat. “I mean, that’s enough strong contenders. Mary can take care of Tim, Troy can take care of Janice –”

“And I’ll take care of you two,” Emily interrupted cheerfully and Ben laughed.

“Taking care of Ben Arnold is really more of a full-time job,” Sammy’s lips twitched and Emily grinned over at him.

“Alright, we’ll split it – fifty/fifty,” she said and she and Sammy reached across Ben to shake hands.

“I am right here,” Ben complained with an eye roll but his eyes were affectionate.

“Alright, we’ll have a big team,” Sammy gave in, knowing he could still have his priorities in that team, even if he did care about most of the people in it. “As long as no one expects me to add Cynthia to it later. Or God forbid, Pete Meyers.”

“I would _never_ ask you to do that,” Ben said faux-somberly, and they pealed into laughter that felt out of place in the training facility, but it made Sammy feel like the world wasn’t ending around him, so he’d accept these moments as they came, if they ever did again.

* * *

 

Ron did most of their work in securing alliances, because that was what Ron did. Once they told him to get Troy, Mary, and Tim on their team, he’d made short work of contacting their mentors and getting information to them.

It seemed to all go well enough – Sammy vaguely remembered the process that he’d gone through with Ben, who was the only person he’d ever mentored, but alliances in this Games were much more instrumental to survival than they ever had been before. They were all adults here, adults who’d proved themselves capable before. None of them would be going down without a fight, so they needed to band together.

Sammy didn’t necessarily like how large their group was, but safety in numbers was certainly something to consider. Besides, he was pretty sure everyone knew that if any bullets or arrows came their way, Sammy was jumping in front of Ben first and foremost.

There was really only one thing he needed to do before he surrendered himself to the Games, and he’d been patiently awaiting her response for most of his time in the Capitol that week.

Lily Wright found him on the last day of training, just before the Victors were meant to go in to be evaluated by the Gamemakers of which Sammy was certain Lily was a part of.

“Sammy,” Ben nudged him as they sat together, eating the packaged lunch the Gamemakers had sent them before the evaluations began. “Someone’s here for you.”

Sammy met Lily’s eye across the room and Lily jerked her head outside of the door. Sammy muttered “I’ll be right back,” to Ben and followed her out into the corridor, out of the earshot of the rest of the Victors that had all looked up from their meals to glare at Lily.

“Fucking traitor,” he heard Herschel mutter under his breath and Pippa James replied “shut _up_.”

The door, thankfully, was steel and impenetrable, even to soundwaves. Lily looked up at Sammy through heavily lidded eyes.

“You sent me flowers,” Lily said, her voice measured and even, but with no small amount of wonder.

“Ron sent you flowers at my request,” Sammy corrected, not willing to show any unnecessary affection quite yet. “Begonias. I thought you’d like them.”

Lily almost smiled at him. Jack used to get her flowers when he’d done something to piss her off, mainly because Lily said that she hated getting flowers because she was allergic. It was a way for Jack to simultaneously apologize to her but also be his ordinary, snarky, sarcastic self. Lily pretended that it pissed her off more, but Sammy could always see right through. And she could always see right through him, too.

“It was a discreet calling card, I’ll give you that,” Lily said. “So what is it? This can’t just be for a last farewell. I’m not getting you another map, Stevens. This year is locked up tighter than tight.”

“No,” Sammy shook his head. “I’ve got a bigger favor, actually.”

Lily’s eyebrows rose into her hairline. “I make no promises.”

“I know you, Lily,” Sammy started, figuring it was as good a place as any. “I know you wouldn’t be here, doing the things you’re doing, betraying where you came from, if it wasn’t for a damn good reason. I think I know what the reason is. And if I’m right – and I am – then you’re the only person who can get me what I need.”

Sammy told her, in no uncertain terms, exactly what it was that he needed.

Lily stared at him for a long minute, her expression unreadable.

“When I heard you volunteered,” Lily said, emotion slowly creeping into her voice, though Sammy couldn’t quite pinpoint what emotion it was, “I was shocked. I was furious. I was appalled. But then I thought for a minute – and I realized that it was the best I could hope for you. You get to die for your best friend. It’s what you’ve always wanted.”

Sammy didn’t answer.

“I loved Jack,” Lily said quietly. “And I know you did, too. I’ve never believed there’s life after death but – I hope wherever you go next, you find him there. I can get you what you need. You’ll just have to trust me.”

“Of course I trust you,” Sammy’s voice came out strangled and scratchy, but it was solid. “I’ve never liked you, but I’ve always trusted you.”

Lily almost laughed. “Don’t try to flatter me to get a better score on your evaluation this afternoon. I’m planning on bringing your rating down by vindictively giving you a one.”

“I don’t give a shit,” Sammy told her, but it was ruined by his smile, and she flipped him off as she walked away, down the corridor, presumably toward the rest of the Gamemakers.

It wasn’t a picture-perfect goodbye, but it was good enough for them.

* * *

 

Ben was practically vibrating in his seat as Ron poured the five of them some hard liquor to watch the release of the evaluations.

“Honestly, Benny, calm down,” Emily said, stroking the back of Ben’s neck. “Whatever this is can’t change too much – everyone already knows that all of us are capable of winning. This is more of a formality than anything.”

“It’s still nerve-wracking though,” Ben said, taking a long drink out of the glass that Ron handed him, his legs bouncing up and down. Sammy forcibly kept the one closest to him still, but the second he let go, Ben kept jittering. He supposed he might as well just let him.

“Just remembered it’s curved on a different scale,” Ron said, patting Ben’s shoulder from behind them. The Capitol apartment they were all in was spacious and roomy, entirely too empty, but with the five of them there, it felt almost like a home. “Like Emily said – everyone here is capable. There isn’t any dead weight.”

“Sometimes it feels like all four of us are dead weight, especially next to Rose,” Janice muttered from Emily’s other side, and honestly, Sammy kind of agreed with her. Watching Rose do anything could create a gaping inferiority complex.

District One flashed first with Rose and Archie’s scores – Rose’s was naturally a nine, while Archie was a bit more doable with a four. Larry from Two clocked in at a four as well with Reagan doubling him with an eight – Pete fucking Meyers was a five, Riley a three, Dan a six, Pippa a seven –

Janice’s name flashed across the screen with a four, and Janice let out a sigh, probably of relief. It wasn’t the lowest score.

Sammy’s name flashed next – a five.

“I assume I deserved a six,” Sammy said to no one in particular, “since Lily told me she was purposefully going to bring down my score. Because I’m definitely better than Pete Meyers.”

“What happened in that conversation anyway?” Ben said, giving Sammy a concerned look. Sammy avoided answering him by gesturing back at the screen where District Six’s names were flashing.

Pearl with another four, Troy with an eight – nice to have an eight on their team if nothing else. Katie Lynch had a matching eight, Doyle with the new lowest at a two, quickly met by Cecil Sheffield’s two, followed by Mary’s six – so far, Janice and Sammy were definitely the team’s weak links.

Chet and Cynthia with matching sixes came next, then Esther Rawlins with a two and Herschel with a nine, to no one’s surprise. Sheila clocked in at a seven, and then there was Tim with a four – hey, Sammy was doing better than somebody –

Emily’s name flashed next with a four next to it as well, and then finally Ben’s with a two.

“Hey, nice!” Ben grinned as if he didn’t give a fuck, and maybe he didn’t, but Sammy still gave him a questioning look. “I got a _one_ during my Games. I’m moving up in the world.”

“And you still won, so we know that the scores don’t mean jack shit,” Ron declared. “Just be your charming self in your interview tomorrow and all’s gonna be fine.”

“I got a four during my Games as well and I still won,” Emily pointed out, turning to Janice. “Didn’t you get a four, too?”

Janice nodded. “Sammy got a seven, though, I remember that.”

Sammy quickly diverted the attention from himself by saying “Hey, you’re looking at a bonafide _ten_ here with Mr. Ron Begley.”

Ben’s eyes lit up. “Oh man, you’re _kidding._ ”

Sammy silently excused himself from the situation by raising his glass like he was about to go pour himself another drink, but instead he slipped out of the room and headed up the glass elevator to the rooftop.

He finished off his whiskey as he stared at the Capitol sprawled out below him. This awful, virulent city had taken everything from him – but hadn’t it given him something, too? Hadn’t it given him Jack? Lily? Ben? Emily? Hadn’t it given him all of these people he loved with all his being but then left him in the end?

He supposed none of them had _really_ left. Ben and Emily were just downstairs. Lily was in a building he could probably see right now. Even Jack – Jack was gone, but it wasn’t of his own free will. He would’ve stayed if he had the choice. Sammy liked to think he would’ve stayed, as difficult as their lives were, because they made them mean something when they were together _._

“Don’t tell me you came up here to be melancholy all by yourself when you could have been melancholy downstairs with the rest of us,” Sammy heard Ben before he saw him, but he turned to face his friend with a laugh.

Sammy remembered the first conversation he and Ben had on a rooftop and gestured for Ben to come sit next to him near the ledge. Not on the ledge – there was glass separating them from being able to jump. Couldn’t give Tributes access to suicide, or too many would take the option.

“I’m sure you only got a two because you didn’t kill anyone in your first Games,” Sammy said after a moment of silence, “and not anything you did for evaluation.”

“I tripped over my own feet four times,” Ben said with a snort. “And really, I don’t care. Like Ron said, there are more important things.”

“The interviews tomorrow,” Sammy said with a sage nod. “You did great in your interview. Maggie loved you, thought you were the sweetest thing. And you haven’t changed too much since then.”

Ben laughed. “Well, you sure changed since you were Shotgun Sammy. I remember you being such an asshole in your interview. I went back and watched in the archives a couple years ago – I couldn’t _believe_ it was you.”

“I was never like that, you know,” Sammy said, his heart in his throat. “Never. It was all an act.”

“I figured,” Ben said with a small grin. “But why’d you pick the asshole act when you’re so…not? I mean, it was smart, it obviously worked, you’ve got a reputation for it now. But at the time…”

Sammy cleared his throat purposefully. “It was Ron’s idea. We’re – Ron and I, we – we’re the types who don’t fit in with – with what people expect of us. Ron thought I should play up the parts of me that – that are the expectation.”

Ben blinked at him. “What…what do you mean?”

Sammy hesitated, staring out at the city beneath him, the barrage of lights. He and Ben had known each other for three years now, and Ben had seen parts of him that Sammy wished he didn’t have, and still came out the other side as his friend. He should get to know this part, too.

Someone should get to know. Before Sammy died, someone should know who he was, who he _really_ was underneath the masks, the bravado, the laughter, the _Shotgun Sammy_ of it all. Someone should know. Sammy should get to say it out loud, at least once, to someone.

And it should be Ben who heard it. So that maybe, before he’s gone, his best friend could understand him. Just once. Just for a moment.

“I have to tell you something,” Sammy said, tears blurring the corners of his vision already. Ben blinked at him, eyes wide. “You have to understand something, before all of this starts. Before it all ends. Before every one of our movements is caught on camera. You have to know –”

He broke off, voice cracking, and Ben shifted slightly to put an arm around Sammy’s shoulder and squeeze.

“Hey, c’mon,” Ben said, nervously laughing a little. “I’m your best friend, and we’ll both be dead soon. You can tell me anything.”

“I just want you to know…know who I am,” Sammy said, unable to look at Ben, could only look at the lights. “I want someone to know who I am.”

“Hey, I know you,” Ben said with that brilliant smile of his. “No matter what this is, I already know you, alright? I wish everyone else in the world knew you like I did – could see that you’re not some selfish asshole Shotgun Sammy. That you’re the most selfless person I’ve ever met.”

“I’m not, though,” Sammy said, shaking, hot tears threatening to spill over any second. “I’m the most selfish – the most selfish person to ever – God, Ben, all I’ve wanted to do for so long is die. To have all this end. But what always stopped me was you, you and Emily, because you needed me. But now –”

Sammy swallowed, thinking of Lily, of how she hit it right on the nose. “I get my wish. I get to die. I get to die for you. I couldn’t die for – for – for _Jack –_ but I can still die for you.”

“Jack?” Ben blinked at him for a moment, head tilted, and Sammy couldn’t believe he finally said his name out loud.

“You remember Jack Wright,” Sammy said, not giving Ben time to answer. “Lily’s brother. Won the Games the year after me. Smartest guy in the world, won by finding all those wires and hooking them up to get lighting to strike, killed ten people in one instant to win. He was – my best friend. Lily, Jack, and I were inseparable for years. They were the only people who could understand me – understand what I was going through – who didn’t see me as Shotgun Sammy, but as a fucking kid who didn’t know how to deal with the fact that I’d gutted someone, that I was literally still finding his blood in my fingernails.”

Sammy suddenly found he couldn’t keep talking, the tears coming in fast and hot, and he choked back a sob.

Ben didn’t say anything, probably to encourage Sammy to keep going, but his arm around Sammy’s shoulder tightened almost imperceptibly.

Sammy shuddered and made himself keep talking because if he didn’t get this all out now, he never would. “It wasn’t long before Jack was more than just my best friend, he was – he was my _everything_. I loved him – I loved him so goddamn much, but no one could ever know because –”

“ _Oh_ ,” Ben said softly when Sammy didn’t continue, and his other arm came up to hug Sammy to him. “Like that. Okay, like that. It’s okay. It’s okay, I don’t care, you know I don’t care. That’s what you meant by you and Ron not fitting – I knew Ron had always – it’s okay. It’s okay.”

Sammy let Ben hold onto him for a second longer before he made himself let go, take a deep breath, and keep talking. “When you’re a Victor, they make you do shit. Shit you don’t want to do. You escaped the worst of it because you were Twelve’s only Victor, so you went straight to being a mentor. But those of us who don’t, we have to fill other roles. My role was to be a roguish asshole always a second from snapping. And Jack –”

Sammy’s voice caught. “Jack was handsome and charming in way few people are, so his role was to sleep through all the women in the Capitol.”

“Oh my God,” Ben breathed. “That’s –”

Sammy laughed bitterly. “Yeah. Not that we could’ve been together like that in public anyway. But it made it a hell of a lot worse. I was better at standing for it than Jack was, though. Jack wanted to get out. Escape.”

“Shit,” Ben said, his voice suddenly clear and scared. “He – God, I forgot, didn’t he – didn’t he…kill himself?”

“No,” Sammy bit his lip to keep from either laughing or crying, he wouldn’t sure which would come out. “No, he didn’t. He was looking for District Thirteen.”

Ben stared at him like something finally clicked in his head, like the puzzle pieces suddenly fit together, and Sammy felt a little like he was going to be sick, but also had a dizzy, hot swoop of relief.

“Did he find it?” Ben whispered.

Sammy shook his head. “One day, he was just gone. Nothing. All his stuff was still here. His clothes, his research, everything. He was just gone without a trace. But not to Thirteen. I knew it wasn’t to Thirteen, because that’s when it started. The threats. The coercions. Judd Gunderson at my doorstep every other day, telling me that I’d better do as the Capitol pleased…because I didn’t want them to take it out on Jack.”

Ben sucked in a breath. “They took him.”

“Lily thinks they killed him,” Sammy said, the thought twisting and turning in his gut. “But I know they didn’t. I know he’s alive. Maybe alive is too strong a word for it. I know he’s not dead. But they found him out, and they’ve been using him against me ever since.”

“I’m so sorry,” Ben said immediately, a hand going to Sammy’s shoulder and squeezing. “If I had known – God, our last argument, fuck I was so stupid –”

“You didn’t know,” Sammy said a little helplessly but Ben cursed under his breath.

“I was accusing you of being spineless, of taking orders – fuck, if I had known…” Ben shuddered. “And there I was, going on about District Thirteen. I can’t imagine…”

“You’re a lot like him,” Sammy said, and this was the hardest part to get out because God, he loved Ben, he loved Ben so much it hurt, but Ben had to know that it was different, it was separate, that it wasn’t the same as Jack, that their relationship wasn’t just built off of Jack. “But it was never like that with us. I want to keep you safe because you’re my friend and I can’t stand to lose you.”

“This was right before you met me, wasn’t it,” Ben said, and it wasn’t a question. “This was why you became a mentor for Twelve.”

“Ron didn’t know about Jack,” Sammy said with a lump in his throat. “But he knew I was spiraling, and needed someone to fight for. You’ve always been that for me, Ben. Someone to fight for. Someone to die for. I was a coward before, with Jack. I should have rebelled. I should have tried to find Thirteen and start a fucking revolution. I should have fought back against the Capitol to try to save him from whatever they did to him. I should have done whatever it fucking took, but now it’s too late, it’s over, because we’re going back into the arena tomorrow and it’s all gonna end. So goddammit Ben, please. I want to die for you. Please let me die for you.”

He was crying, he realized numbly, and Ben was practically holding him up to keep from collapsing, and Ben was saying something too, something that sounded like “No. No, I can’t. Not yet, Sammy. Not yet.”

* * *

 

The spotlights were bright and fluorescent on the stage as a dolled up Maggie Masterson traded places at the interview chairs with the smarmiest of men in the form of Burt Gladstone. They traded off the interviews, Burt interviewing the women and Maggie the men. Sammy felt bad for all of the women who had to sit through the stiflingly awful interview with only Burt for company. At least Maggie had heard of empathy.

“Thanks, Burt, and now we have District Five’s Tribute – his name’s Samuel Stevens, but I’m sure everyone here knows him better as Sh-sh- _Shotgun_ Sammy!” Maggie flashed the crowd her whitest smile as they burst in a raucous applause that Sammy didn’t need or deserve.

Sammy didn’t look backwards, and infused every step with the kind of swagger and charisma that Sammy never naturally had a drop of, but Shotgun had in boatloads. He kissed Maggie’s hand when he saw her, pulling her closer as if to kiss her on the mouth, before letting her go with a shove. Maggie giggled, but Sammy could see the harshness in her eyes.

She’d been around Sammy long enough to know what was an act and what wasn’t and she definitely knew Shotgun was a ruse at this point. Most people Sammy met had known that, ever since Jack disappeared and Sammy started spiraling out of control with only Ben Arnold keeping him somewhat steady.

“Well, Shotgun, it’s been thirteen years since you wowed the Capitol with the most kills of any individual Tribute in the history of the Hunger Games,” Maggie said as if the fact was exciting and not horrendous. “How does it feel to be back after all this time?”

“Excellent,” Sammy replied, letting his smile look as sleazy and unhinged as ever. “Really looking forward to beating that record.”

“Now, most of the audience at home knows this, but you actually _volunteered_ for the Games,” Maggie said, “taking the place of your former mentor Ron Begley. Now, the question on everyone’s minds is if you volunteered specifically so Ron wouldn’t have to compete?”

She was giving him an out, a way to look sympathetic, but Shotgun Sammy had never been one for sympathy.

“Ron’s a great guy and has always been a friend to me,” Sammy told her, probably the only honest thing he’d say in this interview. “But I’d be lying if I said it was for him.”

Unwittingly, his eyes went to Ben, who was standing at the end of a long line of Victors waiting for their turn onstage. He was too far away to see Ben’s expression, but the reminder that Ben was still here, still with him, still the reason that Sammy kept going, was enough to bolster him forward.

“No one’s ever won the Games twice,” Sammy said with a smirk and a wink at the audience. “I’m here for the glory.”

The crowd loved it. Sammy’s heart clenched in his chest, but thinking about Ben made all of this just a little easier to stomach.


	3. You're going to die in your best friend's arms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. Um. I thought this fic was going to be three chapters. It's...not. It's going to be four. This one ended up being way longer than anticipated, and I still wasn't done with it, and I figured it would make the most sense to have a shorter fourth installment instead of a super-long third installment that didn't post for another couple days.
> 
> I hope the tags are appropriate, but here's some warning - there's death in this chapter. You've all seen the Hunger Games. People die. There is not MCD, or I would've tagged for it. Further notes on this at the bottom.
> 
> I hope I have the fourth part up tomorrow? I can't make any promises, but I will try since it won't be quite as long as any of these parts. I hope you guys like this part, I'm actually kind of proud of it! (I hate writing fight scenes and everything about them, and there's...so many.) Thanks for reading!!

Sammy didn’t get to say any goodbyes.

There was normally time to say goodbye, whether it was just a brief shake of hands with your mentor, a final wish of good luck with your fellow district tribute, or a few minutes left alone with a stylist before the Games began.

But not this year. Sammy had been awoken roughly with a shove, dragged down a blank and sterile hallway, and shoved into a room where cargo pants, a white shirt, leather jacket, and hiking boots were all laid out pristinely on a bench, the only furniture in the otherwise empty room.

There was the chamber, too, still locked off, but Sammy knew it would whir and turn on and he’d need to step inside of it to be shot upward and into the Games.

Someone would have to come and make sure he actually did that – probably a guard, a Peacekeeper, maybe even Judd Gunderson himself would stop by to threaten him for the last time.

Sammy didn’t think about his own Games often, but as he pulled on his clothes, the last clothes he’d ever wear, he couldn’t help but remember. He’d been with his stylist just before, a Capitol woman named Gloria, who had kissed his cheek and wished him luck. He’d gotten to say goodbye to Ron beforehand, where Ron had given him one final push.

_You come back in one piece or I’ll have to bring you back to life just to kill you myself._

Sammy had gotten a brief goodbye with Ben before his Games too – Ben had looked so lost and forlorn, and told Sammy that he really wished that they would’ve gotten to meet years ago instead of days before Ben had to die, and Sammy, who had thought he ran out of tears for anyone but Jack, got choked up as he said his goodbye too.

_Ben – I know you’ve got your mom to come back to, and Emily Potter. But come back for me, too, alright?_

Ben’s eyes had lit up, joyous and happy and he promised he would. Sammy remembered thinking that if that’s the last time he saw Ben Arnold, at least he’d remember him like that.

It was much more dramatic this time – Sammy hadn’t gotten a goodbye. He saw Ben last night, before they were forced into mandatory and strictly enforced bedtime, and he’d hugged him then, but he hadn’t thought it would be goodbye for good.

These first ten minutes, they would be the worst part, because if Ben could survive that, Sammy could find him again. But anyone could die at the start, a weapon could go flying in Ben’s direction and Sammy could be a thousand feet away. But Sammy couldn’t think about that, couldn’t consider it, because he had to see Ben again, he had to –

“Stop overthinking. You’re gonna hurt yourself before you even get up there.”

Sammy looked up from his pacing to see Ron standing in the doorway that separated this room from the rest of the world, a world he was now cut off from. He didn’t think he’d have a chance at seeing a friendly face again, and he sighed shakily in relief.

“Ron,” Sammy tried his best to smile at his mentor, who he owed well, everything. He never would’ve met Ben without Ron – hell, wouldn’t have ever met Jack because without Ron, Sammy would’ve died at sixteen. “How’d you get permission to be here?”

“I promised the guards that old Shotgun Sammy wouldn’t be taken quietly,” Ron said with a sardonic roll of his eyes, “and that I was their best bet to get you where you needed to be without a fight. Plus, I’ve been in and around the Capitol for damn near thirty years now. They can’t tell me I can’t come say a heartfelt goodbye.”

“Heartfelt?” Sammy said, trying for joking, but coming off sincere.

“I’m here to tell you that I’m proud of you,” Ron said, a little gruff, not quite meeting Sammy’s eye, “and that as much as I’m angry with you for volunteering in my place – and oh, I _am_ angry, you’d best believe – but I’m proud of you the same. The world might remember you as a sleazy asshole who did it all for the fame, but I won’t. Alright?”

“Even if it hadn’t been for Ben,” Sammy said quietly, “I probably would’ve volunteered in your place anyway.”

“Damn fool,” Ron muttered under his breath, but he was smiling when he met Sammy’s eye.

“If –” Sammy started, but emotion caught got in his throat and he had to pause. “If Ben lives – you’ll take care of him, right? Make sure he doesn’t do any stupid shit.”

“Ben’s always going to do stupid shit,” Ron said without missing a beat. “Learned that from you.”

He and Sammy shared a weak smile, neither of them quite ready to speak again until Ron finally cleared his throat, his eyes shifting back and forth.

“Speaking of Ben,” Ron said, reaching into one of his pockets, stepping closer to Sammy to slip something into his hand, “he wanted me to give you this.”

Sammy looked down into his hand, where Ron had discreetly passed him a heavy silver ring, the initials _MA_ etched onto one of the sides.

Sammy stared down, his heart stuttering just slightly.

“Ben’s dad’s ring,” Sammy acknowledged, clearing his throat to keep emotion from spilling out. Ben had never known his father, his mother never talked about him or what had happened to him – all Ben had of him was his father’s wedding ring.

It had been his token during his Games.

Sammy turned the ring over in his fingers before slipping it onto one of his fingers. It was a little big. He hoped it didn’t fall when he was running.

Well, he could put it somewhere else.

Tentatively, Sammy pulled at the metal loop around his neck that he’d stopped wearing three years ago, but had finally put on again when he knew he’d never be going back to Five.

“I’ll have two,” Sammy said quietly to Ron, whose eyebrows raised significantly when he saw another silver metal band at the end of the necklace. Sammy unclasped it and slipped Ben’s ring on as well. “I’m sure the Capitol can let me off the hook for having two this time around.”

“Who’s ring?” Ron asked, and for some reason, Sammy felt like maybe he already knew the answer.

“Mine,” Sammy swallowed. “Jack Wright gave it to me.”

“I thought he might’ve,” Ron said, expression unchanged. Well, maybe it went a little softer around the edges, but Sammy just stared down at the two rings on the chain before quickly pulling it back around his neck and slipping it under his shirt.

“How’d Ben get the ring to you?” Sammy asked after clearing his throat a couple of times. “Did he give it to you last night?”

Ron shook his head, taking another step closer to Sammy, eyes intent, and with his lips barely moving, he said “They’re staggering the tributes this year.”

Sammy’s heart lurched. “I – what? Stag –?”

“Keep your voice down,” Ron elbowed Sammy to shut him up.

“Is he already…?” Sammy’s breathing got shallower as Ron nodded. “What about Em…?”

Ron shook his head, eyes dark and intent on Sammy’s own.

“Shit,” Sammy whispered, suddenly more nervous than he’d ever been. He’d been planning on the classic bloodbath at the start – fuck, how were they not starting with a bloodbath? The Capitol loved their bloodbaths.

As if reading his mind, Ron muttered “Not sure what the play is. But don’t worry. I have a plan.”

“What?” Sammy asked, leaning back on his old and trusty habit of depending on Ron when there was nothing else left for him.

“Well, it’s Ben’s plan,” Ron said with a modest shrug and all Sammy could do was stare.

“ _Ben’s_ plan –”

“It’s time,” Ron interrupted with a grave expression, though Sammy couldn’t help but be a little frustrated with him, even in their last precious seconds together. “Don’t worry, Sammy. Ben will let you know what your part is.”

“My part?” Sammy stared blankly, even as Ron forcibly pulled him upward and toward the chamber. “My part is to save Ben, and I really don’t think he’s going to be objective –”

“Sammy, shut up for once in your life,” Ron said, expression softening as the two of them stared at each other, Sammy from inside the chamber and Ron from outside of it. There was a soft whizzing sound as glass closed between them. “And learn that even in all your desperation to die for the people you love, they’re just as willing to die for you, too.”

“You better not die for me,” Sammy said, verging slightly on anger even as the glass kept them separate, even as these were the last words he’d ever say to Ron’s face. “If you die for me, I swear to God, I’ll kill you.”

The last thing he heard was Ron’s laugh as the metal tube shot him upward.

Sammy’s heart pounded in his chest for the six seconds of darkness as he was pushed upward, but was quickly greeted by a slowing of the tube, blinking to adjust to the fact that he was no longer in a metal facility, but instead in what seemed to be a dense, sprawling forest, filled with evergreens and deciduous trees alike.

He was also completely alone.

His breath got shorter as the golden-yellow countdown clock started counting down from twenty just above the shortest trees.

There was no one here –but was there? The tributes were staggered in coming into the Games – was one waiting for him already? No – no, he had to see Ben again, Sammy wasn’t afraid to die but he had to see Ben again, make sure Ben would live, he couldn’t die right now, couldn’t die alone on a forest floor, but again, he was alone, no one was there, how the hell was that possible? Why the hell would the Capitol do that instead of a frenzied mass killing to start?

The countdown clock reached zero.

Sammy had been ready to run but now, now he had to let go of that seeping adrenaline and step carefully and quietly off the pod and onto the forest floor. Nothing around him changed. The air was crisp, a little cool but not cold. There was the slightest breeze, but other than that, all around him was entirely still.

Sammy tentatively kept moving, very quietly, because he knew staying put wouldn’t end well for him – something, whether it be a tribute or a Capitol-engineered mutt, would come for him if he didn’t move.

He needed to find – well, something. Food? Shelter? A weapon?  Where the hell would the weapons be if not in the center as the Cornacopia?

Shit, where the hell even was Sammy? Was he near the center, or closer to the edge? He couldn’t see the sun, what direction it was in – shit, shit, shit, that was important, he had to know where the sun was to figure out directions, that was the most important thing –

Well, it would be the most important thing, after he found Ben and found a weapon, preferably in that order, though Sammy would take any order that involved him seeing Ben again.

He had to come across someone soon – they needed some blood spilled to start, the surprise of the Victors at having a Games set up they weren’t familiar with was tricky of them and would certainly pay off, but they needed blood, they had to start with blood.

Sammy should climb a tree, get a good vantage point of what was going on around him – hopefully see the sun, maybe see some tributes down below – and figure out exactly where the hell he was and where the hell he needed to be to get a weapon or a pack of supplies.

Maybe this Games didn’t have weapons or supplies, Sammy thought grimly, maybe they want to see how crazy the tributes would go without anything, any food or water, and see if they could get them to kill with their bare hands.

That was Sammy’s last coherent thought before he stepped on a collection of grass and sticks on the ground, and fell feet first downwards – but not onto the forest floor ground, he plunged past the forest floor with a shocked gasp, and downward into a dark, dank hole in the ground that had been obscured from his view.

Sammy cried out as he first fell, and hated himself for it as he struggled to get to his feet in the darkness surrounding him. He’d called attention to himself – whether it was from above or somewhere down here, surely someone was within earshot.

Rubbing his already bruised knees, Sammy realized that the cavern around him wasn’t as dark as he initially thought. It was a huge expanse of something almost like a room or a mine, mines like the ones Ben and Emily had back in District 12 – there was no coal or other precious metal, but it had the kind of artificial light Sammy associated with mining.

He took stock of the situation, looking at the patch of yellow sunlight a couple feet above from where he fell – he might be able to climb out, but it wasn’t going to be easy to do on his own, and not particularly quiet either.

On the other hand, the cavern around him seemed to have several passages leading out of it, all looking at least semi-lit by what had to be artificial light.

The Capitol presumably wanted Sammy down in these caverns and not up above, and that usually would have been enough to get Sammy to try to climb out. But he didn’t know what Game the Capitol was trying to play right now, and if he wanted answers, answers and a chance to find Ben, a weapon, or both, he needed to stay here, at least for now.

Treading carefully forward, Sammy made peered down the second passageway on his right – he could see the most there, and the dirt-covered and dank walls didn’t hold any people that he could see. He started stepping into it, very quietly; taking care not to let his feet make any sound against the uneven rocky ground.

Sammy walked like that for what felt like ten minutes, though he had no way to know for sure. There didn’t seem to be any other passages that led away from this one, which made him feel more than a little trapped, but presumably why he was down here would be revealed soon enough.

The passageway seemed to peter off in the next few hundred steps, opening up into another chamber similar to the one Sammy had been in before, but much smaller. Instead of being the size of a full mine, it was maybe the size of a large bedroom, with three different tunnels leading out of it, one of which Sammy had just came in from.

But then Riley Bevins peered her head around the one to his left, and a piece slid into place.

Her eyes widened almost comically when she saw Sammy, and they were close enough that he could hear the breath of air she sucked in and didn’t let out.

Slowly, Sammy raised his hands in a defensive position as he purposefully backed away from her. She took a step forward, into the small chamber, mimicking his pose.

They began to circle each other slowly, Sammy’s breath coming out quick and short and Riley’s mouth set in a hard line.

“I don’t have a weapon,” Sammy said after a few seconds of posturing and Riley nodded, blinking meaningfully a couple of times.

“Me neither,” she said shortly, stopping the circling motion to face him, though her hands still stayed up. Sammy stopped with her.

“We leave, go our separate ways,” Sammy said, and making it sound like a statement and not a question. “Pretend like we never saw each other.”

Riley’s gaze was suspicious, but she seemed to realize it was her best option with a short nod. “Agreed. But if I see you again and I have a knife, I won’t hesitate.”

“I –” Sammy started, but then saw a flash of something behind Riley’s ear, in the tunnel she had her back to. He didn’t know what it was – a person? A monster? Ben?

Riley blinked up at him, turning slightly. “What’s –?”

In the next instant, Mary Lowing appeared in the entrance, and Sammy would have been relieved to see her, but that emotion lasted only half a second, for Mary let out a loud cry in the next, and there was a flash of silver – a knife? A sword? – and she cut Riley down where she should.

Riley had been turned away – Sammy saw her crumple, but didn’t see the light leave her eyes. He supposed he should be grateful for that.

Mary stood over her body, a longsword in her hand, a pack on her back, breathing heavily and shakily, her face already stained with tears.

“Hey,” Sammy said slowly, kind of numbly, the world feeling unreal around him. Riley’s body didn’t twitch. Mary had gotten her with one clean swipe. She had a reputation for clean kills. She’d killed seven people in her Games – not even half of Shotgun Sammy’s record, but more than most.

“Hey,” Mary blinked up at him, the arm that held her sword shaking slightly. “I – I didn’t know if she was going to kill you or not. I – I did what I had to do.”

“Of course you did,” Sammy said, even if he felt like he was going to vomit. The Games were judgment-free zone. Sammy certainly wasn’t going to hold Mary to any ordinary moral standard here. If he’d had a weapon, he might have done the same. “Where’d you find the –”

He gestured toward the sword and the pack, and Mary palpably swallowed as she pointed to the wall behind them.

“I got here five minutes ago,” she said, “and found them sitting there. I thought – three passageways. Two more people are coming this way. I should get the weapon and hide. And I was right.”

“That’s the trick,” Sammy said, suddenly overcome with an even stronger urge to throw up. “Get us all in duels to death to start with. We’re all Victors – we all need blood on our hands to prove ourselves worthy of the rest of the Games. It’s not like when we all start together, because here, we can’t run or hide.”

He thought about Ben – Ben was best at running and hiding. He wasn’t best at duels to the death. Sammy couldn’t breathe.

Mary nodded, wiping her eyes with her free hand. “I would’ve preferred a shotgun,” she said with a weak chuckle. “Would’ve been a little easier on my arm.”

Sammy tried to laugh even though he really couldn’t right now, reaching a hand out. “You keep the weapon, you earned it. But I can carry the pack and we can – can try to find Tim and Ben and…and everyone else.”

Mary shuddered as she slipped the backpack off of her shoulder and handed it Sammy’s way. Sammy knew the feeling – there was almost no chance that all of their rather large group would survive these mini-death matches.

“Down here?” Mary asked. “Or do we try to get back up into the woods? I’m pretty short, so I didn’t even try, but you’ve got some verticality, and it’s more doable with two.”

“The woods,” Sammy said, knowing that he had to be somewhere he could see the sun. Then it occurred to him that Lily would know that, too. “I think the caverns are specifically designed for these duels, so that there’s no place to run to. But I’m pretty sure the Games are supposed to be played upstairs. These will just make…good hiding places, later on.”

“Or good places to die alone,” Mary said with a bitter twist of her mouth as she and Sammy headed down the corridor she’d come from, Mary standing ahead with the weapon outstretched and Sammy trailing behind, listening for movement behind them.

It took them about fifteen minutes to find the hole Mary had fallen from, and Sammy got Mary up on his shoulders, making sure her sword was pointed very far away from anywhere it could scrape him, and she pulled him upwards from there into the forest, where the light was a little more natural, though Sammy still had to blink several times to readjust.

“The sun,” Sammy said, pointing upwards where he could see it flitting through a hole in canopy above them.

“What about it?” Mary asked, dusting off her knees as she got to her feet, Sammy quickly following suit, tightening the straps on his pack.

“Just good that we can see it now,” Sammy said, knowing that the first order of business, now that a weapon was nearby, was to find the remaining members of their team. “Have a general sense of direction.”

“Do you think there’s a clearing in the center?” Mary asked, squinting upward at the trees overhead. “Or a clearing anywhere, for that matter?”

Sammy shrugged. “It would make it harder on us if there wasn’t,” Sammy said, “though it would also make for a slower Games if we don’t have any discernable direction as a group. I was going to climb a tree…”

“Good idea,” Mary said with a nod, “though we should find a sturdier one than these – these are all evergreens. We need something deciduous, and preferably large.”

“Back where I came, there were more deciduous trees,” Sammy said, wondering if a forest like this ever occurred naturally, and knowing that it didn’t matter, that everything here had been engineered. “Let’s head that way.”

They walked in silence, but only for a moment. It was dangerous to make noise since it might draw people closer to them – but those people also might be the ones they were looking for.

“I didn’t know you and Tim were engaged,” Sammy offered after a few seconds, and Mary smiled up at him, her eyes worn but somehow still happy despite it all.

“Yeah,” Mary said softly, biting her lip. “Never would’ve worked out to go public, but – we thought maybe a secret ceremony. Or if there was a regime change…but we’ll never get the chance now.”

“I’m sorry,” Sammy said, thinking for a second before squeezing her shoulder. “I – I was engaged once, too. There was a…similar situation.”

Mary’s eyebrows shot upwards, and she even stopped walking for a second as she regarded him with surprise in her eyes. “Really?”

Sammy nodded, a lump in his throat, knowing he couldn’t possibly say Jack’s name – that maybe he could if it was just Mary, because he thought maybe she would understand, but it wasn’t just Mary, it was everyone with a television set.

As it turned out, he didn’t have to, because Mary’s gaze softened a moment later. “Oh. I know who it was.  You don’t have to say it, but I know.”

Sammy blinked at her a couple of times. “How?”

“I’ve been around the Capitol longer than you have,” Mary said, patting Sammy’s shoulder. “I know who you used to be close with.”

“Oh, I didn’t realize we were so –” Sammy started, but then a thought occurred to him with a jolt. “It’s…um, it’s not Lily.”

Mary’s eyes widened even more, but Sammy could tell the instant she pieced it together in her head. Jack, Lily, and Sammy used to do everything together. Lily was the easiest, most convenient guess. But if it wasn’t her, then surely Mary knew who the other option was.

“ _Shit_ ,” Mary whispered, though Sammy could tell it was out of sympathy for the awful situation it had put them in and not a personal judgment on Sammy’s choices. “That’s…God, no wonder no one knew. And then he – oh fuck, Sammy, I’m sorry.”

“It was a long time ago,” Sammy said so they could stop having the conversation, so that the world didn’t have to hear his life story broadcast live. “Look – what about that tree?”

He pointed out a large-trunked deciduous tree nearby, and Mary turned to it with a determined nod, though not without casting another sympathetic look in Sammy’s direction.

“One of us can climb and the other can keep lookout,” Mary said, casting a glance upward, then one at Sammy. “I’ll climb.”

“Is that meant to be an insinuation about something?” Sammy said, almost laughing. “We _are_ the same age.”

“I’m a month younger,” Mary reminded him, handing him her sword. Sammy took it gingerly – it wasn’t his weapon of choice, though it was better than a knife. “Call up if something’s the matter.”

“Will do,” Sammy said as Mary found a foot hole and started slowly but surely moving upward. He gazed around the surrounding areas, but everything was still.

Mary was almost all the way up the tree when Sammy heard a twig snap. He straightened up, grip on the long sword tightening as his eyes went everywhere, but he didn’t see anything.

He heard another twig snap in the next minute, though, and he tentatively stepped forward, giving himself clearance on all sides, his muscles tightening defensively, getting ready to run and fight.

All of that rushed away when he heard a familiar voice call “Sammy?”

“Oh fuck, Emily,” Sammy deflated in relief, letting the sword hang low, as he saw Emily Potter peak out from behind a tree in his peripheral. Her face split into a wide smile when she saw him, though she still crept gingerly toward him for the first couple steps before breaking into a quick spring toward him.

She launched herself into his arms, and he hugged her tightly with the arm that wasn’t holding the sword, as he wasn’t willing to let that clatter to the forest floor just yet. Emily felt real and warm and safe in his arms, which was a high that Sammy could live off of for the next few hours.

“There’s blood on your sword,” Emily said as she broke away from him, anxiety in her eyes. “Who –?”

“Mary killed Riley,” Sammy explained, pointing upwards. “She’s getting a better idea of where we are.”

“Oh, good,” Emily smiled before realizing what she said and quickly corrected, “Good about Mary. Not Riley.”

“I know,” Sammy said, and they both smiled weakly at one another.

“Who have you seen? Who was down in the caves with you?” Sammy asked, stomach churning unpleasantly. He noticed that Emily didn’t have a weapon or a pack.

“No one,” Emily said. “I climbed out as soon as I fell in – it took me a few minutes, but I made it back out. I thought my best chance was up here, and I’d definitely die down there.”

“Good instinct,” Sammy said, his throat dry. “I hope Ben did the same.”

Emily faltered, her complexion going a little grey, and Sammy quickly put an arm around her and squeezed.

They waited for Mary to come down, who greeted Emily with a long, tight hug before turning to Sammy with a grimace. “Can’t see anything – it’s all dense forest. Nothing in the center. But I did see a river to the north, so we can get water there and hopefully find some shelter.”

“Good idea,” Sammy said, readjusting the details in his head. “Which way is north from here?”

Mary led the three of them through the woods, using the sword to feel out if there were any yet undiscovered holes in the ground that would plunge them downward, but they didn’t come across any.

The river was small, but good enough to drink from, and since there were three of them, finding shelter was less important since one of them could always stay up and keep guard for the other two.

The dreaded moment of the evening came when the sky started to light up around them, the Capitol’s music suddenly blaring, and Sammy’s heart jumped out of his chest.

“Oh, God,” Emily said, and it sounded more like a prayer than a curse as she gripped Sammy’s hand tightly, the two of them leaning up against a long, jagged rock they’d all found to keep their backs to tonight. “Oh, God, please not Ben.”

Sammy held her hand tightly as the pictures began to flash.

First was Archie Simmons – God, fuck, dammit, Sammy’s stomach turned. Then Larry from District Two, then Riley and the look on Mary’s face was so miserable, Sammy had to grab her hand with his free one and squeeze that too.

Dan from District Four – Sammy wouldn’t waste any tears, but it wasn’t easy to see, then Pearl Williams, but thank God, not Troy. Katie Lynch was next, she’d always been tough, Sammy wondered who got her, and then Chet Sebastian – well, that was to be expected, Chet wasn’t exactly a fighter anymore, but seeing him meant that Cecil had made it, which they all could breathe easier at.

Herschel and Esther must have made it too, because the next name was Sheila’s, but Tim wasn’t beside her, and he heard Mary say “Oh, thank God, thank God, thank God” from next to him.

Sammy’s heart was in his fucking throat, but the music and pictures faded entirely after Sheila – no names from District Twelve. Ben was alive.

Emily let out a slight whimper and buried her head in Sammy’s shoulder, and Sammy leaned in to press a kiss to her hair. “Hey, it’s alright. He’s out there. We’re gonna find him.”

“I’ll take the first watch,” Mary said, looking at Emily tenderly as she let go of Sammy’s hand. “I won’t sleep knowing that Tim – that Tim’s out there. You two get some rest – I’ll wake you in a few hours, Sammy.”

Sammy nodded at her as she stood, a restless look on her face as she gripped the sword handle and started to pace.

“Let’s get some sleep,” Sammy said softly to Emily. “We’ll find him in the morning, alright?”

Emily nodded, still sniffling, but she gave him a watery smile. “I know we will.”

Sammy gestured for her to lay down, and was planning on moving to get the small, thin blanket out of the pack, but Emily stopped him with a touch of her hand, gesturing for him to come lay next to her.

“Put your arm around me, I won’t bite it off,” Emily told him affectionately. “I don’t want to be alone and neither do you. I promise Ben wouldn’t be jealous.”

“I know he wouldn’t,” Sammy said, holding in a laugh, but doing as Emily told him, letting her curl up into his chest. “Though the Capitol tabloids might have an article tomorrow about how the three of us are in some kind of torrid love triangle.”

Emily laughed, and it was a peaceful and happy enough sound for Sammy to focus on and hold onto as he drifted into uneasy sleep.

* * *

 

Sammy was shaken roughly awake hours later – he’d already been up once to keep guard and let Mary sleep, he thought he’d at least get a few more hours once Emily took over – but Emily was shaking him insistently, her dark hair flying wildly, her eyes matching with nerves and ferocity.

“Get up, c’mon, Sammy, Mary, get up!”

“What –?” Sammy asked groggily, but snapped into hyperawareness when he saw where Emily was pointing.

A swarm – fuck – a whole swarm of yellow and grey not quite bugs and not quite birds were coming toward them, spanning at least six or seven feet in length.

“Tracker jackers!” Mary yelped, grabbing for her sword as Sammy scrambled for the pack – he knew he’d missed some of what was in it, but God, fuck, they needed to run.

“Did you –?” Sammy panted to Emily as he raced behind her, catching up in a few seconds since he had longer legs on his side, even if Emily was more naturally athletic. Mary caught up a second later, winded and with a look of terror in her eye, but at least they were all still here.

“I think someone else must have stumbled on their nest,” Emily panted, and Sammy scrambled to grab a hold of her hand so they wouldn’t get separated. “I just saw them approaching – they probably already stung the hell out of whoever found them –”

 _Not Ben, not Ben_ , Sammy willed to himself as he ran, not making any more conversation so as to save his breath and energy, he hadn’t run like this in years, not since his own Games, fuck fuck fuck –

There was a sudden cry from behind them, _Mary_ – but as Sammy turned to look, Mary just wasn’t there – what the hell, what the hell had happened to her –

“Sammy!” Emily gestured behind them pointedly, and Sammy was going to say they had to keep running even though he just wanted to know what happened to Mary, what the hell had happened to Mary? “There’s a hole!”

She didn’t wait for his mind to catch up, instead running behind them, toward the Tracker Jackers, but instead of going straight into them she slipped into the hole in the brush that Mary had slid into that led down the caverns.

“Shit,” Sammy whispered, quickly following suit, even though the Tracker Jackers were getting closer by the second.

Still, he didn’t feel any stings as he dropped down into the cavern, even if he banged up his knee pretty badly on one of the rocks as he fell.

Mary was still on the ground, grimacing and holding her elbow, but Emily was already up, sweat sticking to her forehead and panting, but already helping Mary to her feet.

“Falling was a pretty smart thing to do,” Sammy told Mary as Emily helped him up next, though the twinge in his knee probably wasn’t going to go away anytime soon. “I don’t think they’re smart enough to follow us down here.”

“Better than being chased down by an angry tribute, that’s for sure,” Mary said, rubbing her elbow with a wince. “We should stay down here at least a couple hours, give the swarm time to dissipate from the area.”

“Do we just want to stay here, or try to look around?” Emily asked, shivering slightly. “I don’t like the caverns, so I’m happy to stay put but…maybe someone we’re looking for is already down here.”

There was a hopeful look on her face, one Sammy knew he mimicked, and he nodded in assent. “Let’s…take a poke around, but not get too far from here.”

His knee didn’t like walking too much, but it was best to get used to it while he wasn’t in a dire, life-threatening situation, and Emily offered him a shoulder to lean on that he took gratefully as they headed down the nearest corridor.

“Shh,” Mary said from ahead of them were she was carrying the long sword with her good arm, stopping short. “Do you hear voices?”

Sammy stopped, swaying a bit against Emily. There were soft murmurs coming from somewhere ahead of them, that was for sure, but they were too far away to recognize the voices.

Then one of the voices let out a sharp cry, clearly from pain, and the three of them exchanged looks.

“Maybe someone’s injured,” Mary said, a look of anxiety on her face, and Sammy gestured for her to go forward, though they crept much more cautiously.

They got close enough to make out words eventually, and though that made Sammy’s anxiety go down, it made his likeliness to throw up or faint go right through the roof.

“Please – please, just kill me –”

“No…no, it’s alright, you’re gonna be alright…”

“Janice,” Sammy breathed, his alarm spiking as he let go of Emily and stumbled forward into the next chamber.

He was right – Janice Finkle was on the ground, blood drying around her stomach, while Troy sat next to her, one of his hands carding through her sweat-soaked hair and the other holding a small knife, though loosely, as if it didn’t want to be in his hands.

“Sammy!” Troy looked up at the sound of the footsteps, his face bright only for a moment before the two of them looked down at Janice, who grimaced up at Sammy with her trademark cynical glare. “Oh, God, Mary and Emily, thank God you’re here.”

“Yeah,” Janie said, her breathing labored, “so one of you can do the deed and put me out of my misery since Mr. Do No Wrong here won’t.”

Troy blinked down apologetically at Janet. “I’ve done a lot of wrong, but I ain’t gonna kill you, Janice, no matter how many times you ask.”

Sammy knelt down next to Janice, whose eyes were hard and knowing.

“Sammy will,” Janice rasped, her confidence sure. “He’ll kill me because he knows I’d kill him if the situation was reversed.”

Sammy didn’t respond, even as Emily knelt down next to him to assess Janice’s wound with quick eyes. It was a gaping hole in her stomach – a bullet. A shotgun.

“Who’s got the shotgun?” Sammy asked quietly.

“Pete Meyers,” Janice said tightly. “He killed Chet Sebastian first, and then me. Just didn’t quite finish the job. Always been lazy like that.”

“Oh, _fuck_ ,” Sammy heard Mary say behind him, and when he turned around he saw what he’d missed when he came in – Chet Sebastian’s crumpled body on the other side of the chamber, a bullet wound in the side of his head.

“I found her last night,” Troy said, tears in his eyes and voice shaking. “I’ve been trying to keep her stable, but –”

“I’m not coming back from this,” Janice said, reaching a hand out blindly at Sammy, who took it without question. “I’m not going to live, and I’m not afraid to die. Whatever’s coming next has to be better than this.”

She didn’t leave anyone else room to question it, not that Sammy would, not right now.

“It will be,” Sammy said, and after only a second’s hesitation, he held a hand out toward Troy.

Troy hesitated as well, but he put the knife in Sammy’s hand.

“I’m really sorry, Janice,” Sammy said quietly. “But you’re right. I’ll do this for you. You deserve to die with – with dignity.”

Janice gave him a weak smile. “Promise you’ll kill that son of a bitch Pete for me, alright?”

“Promise,” Sammy vowed, hand shaking as he moved the knife toward her, but Janice didn’t even shudder. It looked like she’d accepted this a long time ago.

“Do you have anything – anything you want to say?” Sammy couldn’t help but ask. “Not that any of us are guaranteed to get a message back – but you are live on camera, I’m sure.”

“Yeah,” Janice said, one last smile twisting on her lips. “I’ve just got one regret. Someday, someone’s gonna burn the Capitol to the ground – I wish I could’ve seen it.”

She made eye contact with him, a look of fierce determinedness in her eye, and Sammy reached forward, and sliced her throat.

Her eyes widened, just for a second, but Sammy did clean work, too, and the light died in the next second.

“Shit,” Troy said, leaning forward to rest his forehead against Sammy’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, Sammy, I should’ve done it ages ago, the first time she asked, but – but I just couldn’t.”

“It’s okay,” Sammy said, looking at Janice’s body, feeling too much and nothing all at once. “I’ll let you kill that son of a bitch Pete Meyers.”

He could see Troy crack a smile, but then the urge to vomit really did overwhelm Sammy, and he got up to go retch in one of the corners.

“You’re alright,” Emily said as Sammy stumbled away from the corner and back toward his friends. None of them looked at him any differently, which he supposed he should be grateful for, even if it felt like they should be judging him.

Emily put her arms around Sammy’s shoulders to hug him though, and that was enough to ground him, just for a second, and he held onto her tightly.

“We should bury them,” Mary said slowly. “Both Janice and Chet. At the very least, get them up in the forest so they don’t have to – have to stay down here.”

Troy and Sammy carried Chet’s body while Mary and Emily carried Janice’s, and with some difficulty they managed to get both of them up one of the holes a couple of hours later. The Tracker Jackers were gone, thankfully, and that gave them enough time to at least find a nice spot to lay the two of them, side by side, next to a small stream.

“I wish we had a shovel or something,” Emily said as they finally positioned them rightly, and she brought back some wildflowers to lay on each of their chests. “It would be nice to bury them.”

“They look peaceful, though,” Troy said, leaning down to close each of their eyelids for the final time. “I think they would like it.”

“Should we say a few words?” Emily asked, and everyone nodded. “Janice and I were never close, but after I won, she told me some of the best advice I’d ever heard –we have to make the most of the fact that we’re still here when other people aren’t, and live life to the fullest, even in the shitty situation we’re all in.”

She cleared her throat a couple of times, tears in her eyes. “Chet Sebastian would flirt with me at every single Capitol event we both went to, and I turned him down every time. But he always laughed it off and told me I was a feisty little lady, and even though I was slightly offended at the time, he also stopped President Grisham from threatening me by dragging me away to have a drink with him one night, and then didn’t expect me to actually do it. Just told me that I didn’t deserve that from Grisham and to take care of myself.”

Mary grinned. “He’s done the same for me, but with Judd Gunderson. Chet came off as a lecher, but he was a good guy, underneath it all. Janice, I didn’t know very well – but I know she was tough and strong and didn’t take any bullshit, and I’ll miss her.”

She sniffled, and Emily put an arm around her. They turned to Sammy expectantly.

Sammy tried to speak, but found that he had to try a couple of times to get any words out.

“Chet invited me to more threesomes than I can count,” Sammy started, and Mary snorted. “I don’t regret turning him down, but I guess I could’ve been a little nicer about it. And Janice –”

He looked down at Janice’s body, mangled yet still somehow peaceful in death, Emily’s purple wildflowers stark against the red of the blood covering her chest.

“Janice was a bit of a pain in the ass,” Sammy said, voice thick with emotion. “But she’s from my district, she’s from my home and – and she and I always had in common that we were two of the only people that Ron Begley saved. That was special. And I know Ron loved her.”

 He cut off, unable to finish, but Troy took over as he clapped Sammy’s shoulder. “I always thought Chet –”

His next words were cut off by an earth-shattering popping noise, and Sammy would recognize that sound fucking anywhere.

The bullet whizzed by them, just past Troy’s ear and hitting the tree behind them.

“Shotgun,” Sammy said, choking on his own fear, God, fuck, he hated that sound, he’d always hated that sound. “It’s Pete.”

“That was a warning shot!”

But that wasn’t Pete’s voice.

“Doyle?” Sammy asked, taking a protective step in front of his friends as Doyle came toward him – Doyle, fuck, Doyle from District Eight, Doyle who won the Games five years before he had, Doyle who had mentored his own best fucking friend, the friend that Sammy had brutally murdered to win his Games .

Doyle had a fevered look in his eye, though there was no shotgun in his hand – he must have teamed up with Pete, must be here just for Sammy.

“Where’s Pete?” Sammy asked, noticing that though there was no shotgun in Doyle’s hand, there was certainly a knife – a small, jagged knife, the same kind of knife that Sammy had used to kill Chicken Foot Dixon.

“Up,” Doyle said, pointing above them, presumably to a treetop. “Making sure you can’t run. We’ve got a deal, him and me. He’ll let all of your friends go – at least this time – but you have to stay and fight me.”

Sammy hadn’t heard Doyle sound this clear in years – he’d gone into a drugs-related stupor years ago, always sounded high off his ass on something or other, but the withdrawal of being here in the Games and away from anything that could drug him up was evident. There were dark circles under his eyes to contrast the excruciating paleness of the rest of him, his hair was lank and dirty, his eyes wild and crazed.

Sammy flickered a look back to Emily, Troy, and Mary, who all had identical looks of protectiveness and anger, but Sammy couldn’t let them protect him, not from this.

“Go,” Sammy told them, and Emily opened her mouth, presumably to argue, but he cut her off “Get to Ben. Tell him I’m sorry. But you have to go.”

“No way in hell –” Troy started, but then the shotgun went off again, this time hitting a tree much closer to where Troy stood.

“Get away, I’ll follow when I can, just get out of here,” Sammy said, locking eyes with Emily, silently begging, and she seemed to understand.

“We’ll wait,” Emily said, taking Troy and Mary by their elbows and steering them out of harm’s way, out of Pete’s line of sight and into the trees.

“Doyle,” Sammy said, turning back to face the man who was staring at him like he’d waited for this moment all his life. “Why now? You haven’t been angry at me in years. I thought – I thought we’d come to an understanding.”

Doyle had threatened him, back when Sammy had first won when Chicken Foot Dixon’s death was fresh in both of their nightmares, but Sammy thought that they both had reached an agreement that they both wished Chicken Foot Dixon wasn’t dead, and that Sammy had only done it because he had to.

It also helped that Jack had punched Doyle in the face at a certain banquet and Lily had threatened to castrate him if he came near Sammy again, but maybe Doyle had long forgotten his fear of the Wright siblings, or the Games had just given him a new excuse.

“That was outside,” Doyle said, a bit of his old drawl creeping back into his words, even though he looked the opposite of his usual stoned relaxation. “This is inside. Anything can happen in the Games, Shotgun.”

“Don’t call me that,” Sammy’s fingers twitched, and he dove for the knife in Doyle’s hands.

They both had a fist around it, Sammy’s arm hyperextended to keep Doyle from pushing him off, though a swift kick to Sammy’s gut made him let go with a gasp, and Doyle dragged the knife across Sammy’s knuckles, which made him howl.

He managed to kick Doyle’s legs hard enough to make them buckle, though the knife was still firmly in his grasp, and Sammy shoved him backwards, almost falling on top of him from there in an effort to grab the knife.

Then they were both struggling, hands high above their hands, but Sammy was on top of Doyle and in the worse position, since Doyle had the ability to knee him in the balls – which he obviously did at the first opportunity.

Sammy rolled off of Doyle with a groan, but he didn’t have time to focus on the pain, because Doyle was on top of him a second later, and Sammy had to shove his hands up to take the brunt of the knife, and he could feel the cuts in his hands multiplying, but he got a messy, slick hold of Doyle’s fists, and kept the knife away from his chest.

Doyle might have the passion and revenge on his side, but Sammy had height, and presumably strength as well – years on drugs hadn’t done Doyle’s body any favors in that department. Sammy let go with one hand, and got it around Doyle’s neck and squeezed.

Doyle spluttered – Sammy didn’t have the strength to kill him like this, but he had the strength to make Doyle let his fingers go lax, and the knife fell from his grip and onto the grass next to Sammy. Sammy let go of Doyle, grabbed the knife, and flipped them around, pinning Doyle on the ground with the knife tight in one of his blood-slick hands.

Breathing heavily, he looked down. Doyle had struggled against him for a moment, but now he was just staring defiantly up at him, as if daring him to act.

Sammy tried to move his hand – but realized he couldn’t.

He stared down at Doyle, adrenaline still coursing in his veins, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t will himself to move.

All he could think of was grappling with chicken Foot Dixon next to a river that was running red with both of their blood, Dixon’s eyes going wide with fear as Sammy finally got the upper hand, the shotgun long forgotten behind him, and he dug the knife deep into his chest with horrified finality. He’d been so scared to die.

That particular memory had stopped haunting Sammy years ago, but the pain and terror of that moment flooded his system, and just for a second, he was sixteen again.

He let the knife go lax in his hands, standing up, and he reached a hand out to Doyle beneath him

Doyle stared up at him from flat on his back, his gaze full of confusion and terror, but he took his hand and let Sammy pull him up to his feet. “What the fuck –?”

Sammy was going to say something – maybe something snarky, but probably something heartfelt and meaningful – but he was cut off by the bang of the shotgun, followed by the whizzing of a bullet.

Sammy thought _shit, this is it, this is the moment I die_ , but the bullet didn’t hit him. The bullet hit Doyle, who crumpled to the ground in front of him.

“Oops,” Pete Meyers said, now in Sammy’s full view, shotgun loose in his grip as he smiled ferociously in Sammy’s direction.

“What the hell, Pete?” Sammy said, something churning in his stomach as he looked down at Doyle’s body. “He was on your side.”

“Served his purpose,” Pete said with a shrug, his eyes unremorseful. “He wanted to kill you. But then, he took your hand. Like a chump. So it only made sense. He’s a pretty useless ally, anyway.”

“Fuck you,” Sammy said. “Why couldn’t you have just shot _me_?”

“Oh, I’m going to,” Pete said, brandishing the shotgun in Sammy’s direction, though he didn’t shoot yet. Maybe Sammy still had time to get it away from him. “I was planning on shooting your little buddy Benny first, though he’s not here. Probably already dead.”

“Why do you hate us so much, Pete?” Sammy asked, biding for time. “Doyle, I get. I killed Chicken Foot Dixon. But why you? ‘Cause really, it seems like you’re just an asshole.”

“I don’t hate you,” Pete said, though it was flippant enough to sound like he sure as hell did. “I’m just doing what I have to do, following my orders, winning these Games.”

“You’re – wait, _orders_?” Sammy backtracked, suspicion building. “What orders, Pete?”

Pete had never been the smartest guy in the world, but he’d always been one of the most arrogant, so Sammy wasn’t surprised that he forewent shooting Sammy and instead explained himself, because that was the kind of guy he was.

“Direct orders from Howard Ford Beauregard himself,” Pete declared like it was something to be impressed by. “I’m the Gamemakers’s favorite to win, bitch. 

And he told me that the surest way to win was to make sure you and Ben Arnold didn’t make it to the top ten.”

“I get killing me,” Sammy hedged, trying to think his way out of this. Fuck, Jack could do it if he was here, Sammy just had to think like Jack. Keep him distracted. Take steps closer when he didn’t see. Throw the knife he still had in one of his bloody hands. “But why Ben and not…Rose? Ben’s not a heavy hitter here.”

“I don’t question my orders,” Pete said with the kind of arrogance that only someone following orders could have. “And if Mr. Beauregard thinks Benny Arnold is better off dead, who am I to argue? The tiny little son of a bitch has it coming for all I –”

Sammy didn’t quite understand what happened next. His brain wasn’t quite processing it as it happened, but all he knew was that someone behind Pete that seemed to appear there in a single instant launched themselves at Pete from behind, with a flash of metal high in the air, and then Pete was suddenly on the ground, his head not quite connected to his body anymore, and very, very dead.

“Hey,” Ben’s voice interrupted Sammy staring down at Pete’s body, now lying almost exactly on top of Doyle’s, just in the opposite direction. “Hey, are you alright?”

“I…Ben?” Sammy had to blink several times to register that the figure who had killed Pete was in fact Ben Arnold – Ben Arnold holding a fucking blood-covered _machete_ – and that Ben had saved his life. “Where the hell did you come from?”

“I was hiding behind a tree,” Ben said, letting the machete fall from his grip as he half-collapsed onto the ground next to Pete’s body, still breathing heavily. “Tim and I saw what was going down, and he ran after Mary and the others to make sure they stayed safe, but he gave me the machete so that I could take out Pete.”

“You hid behind a tree?” Sammy said, still a bit confused about that point, though even in his numbness could feel a sting of relief that Tim was alright.

“Well, I’m very small,” Ben said with a serious expression, but cracked a smile when he and Sammy met eyes and Sammy finally let himself believe that this was real life crossed the ten feet to Ben, collapsing on the ground next to him and pulling him close.

“Hi,” Ben said as they rocked back and forth slightly, Sammy trying not to cry, and Ben sounded a little choked up, too. “You’re getting your blood all over me. S’super gross.”

They both laughed, and Sammy could breathe again.

* * *

 

Everyone’s reunion was bittersweet – Emily and Ben ran to each other with love in their eyes and kissed for approximately forever and Tim and Mary curled around each other like it was the last time, but there was so much death around them, limited time that they all had left together, and they all knew that their reunion could be cut short at any moment.

Troy bandaged up Sammy’s hands with the first-aid that was in Mary’s pack – now they had two, and could be a little less discerning about what to use when – and then he and Emily had gone out in search of food. Mary and Tim were out scouting for a place to for a group that large to sleep that night.

That left Sammy and Ben sitting against a large oak tree, Sammy still feeling a bit sick from blood loss, and Ben had chosen to stay with him instead gone out foraging for nuts and berries.

“I failed all of the edible plants test,” Ben told him when Sammy tried to say he’d be fine on his own. “I’ll be useless.”

So the two of them sat together, mostly in silence for the first couple of minutes, but Ben had never been silent for more than five minutes in his life. He even talked in his sleep.

“Why couldn’t you do it?” Ben asked when everyone else was firmly out of earshot. “Kill Doyle?”

Sammy shrugged, a bitter taste in his mouth. “I guess I thought he had the right to be angry with me. Killing Chicken Foot Dixon is one of the worst things I’ve ever done.”

“You killed plenty of people in your Games – hell, you hold the record for it,” Ben said with a nervous laugh. “Why him?”

“Everyone else, I killed with a shotgun,” Sammy said, his stomach churning. He’d let Ben carry the shotgun back to the group, and then let Troy have it in case they found an animal to shoot for their meal. The idea of carrying a shotgun himself again made him feel like death rolled over. “In the end, it was just me and Chicken Foot Dixon, playing our cat and mouse game. He finally got the shotgun away from me, sailed it down the river – but I got his knife out of his hands. Killed him with his own weapon. And then I won.”

Sammy’s mouth went dry. Ben’s shoulder brushed against his own.

“I would have nightmares about it,” Sammy said. “Doyle used to threaten me, tell me he was coming for me, back before he got strung out on drugs. I just – I couldn’t do it to him, too. In the exact same way. That wouldn’t be just for survival. That’d make me…I don’t know, a monster.”

“No, it wouldn’t,” Ben said softly. “If that made you a monster, then I’d be a monster too, because I just killed Pete Meyers with a machete.”

Ben’s lip quivered, just slightly, and Sammy quickly stowed away his own past to comfort Ben in the present, because Sammy hadn’t just killed someone – but Ben had.

“You saved me,” Sammy said quietly, putting a hand on Ben’s shoulder. “You saved Emily, Troy, Mary – everyone. Because he sure as hell would’ve come for them next.”

“I’ve just never done it before,” Ben said with a weak smile. “Everyone else in this Games is prepared – because they’ve done it before, at least once, probably more. But not me. I’ve never killed anyone. Until now.”

Sammy let Ben lean against his shoulder as he quietly said “You don’t have to feel guilty. I know you will anyway. But you don’t have to. You’re not obligated to. And none of us here will ever look at you any differently – because we’ve all done worse. I hate that you had to kill someone, but I hate the Games for that, not you, alright?”

Ben sniffled a little, but he still grinned widely up at Sammy, looking just like that sixteen year old kid Sammy had tried so desperately to keep innocent.

“I want to give you something,” Sammy said suddenly, making a split-second decision as he pulled the silver chain out from under his shirt.

Ben blinked curiously at him, but smiled. “Oh. The token – that’s for you, Sammy. That’s a gift from me because – well, you’re not my dad or anything, because that would be weird. But you’re my brother. You’re the brother I always wished I had. You’re family to me in the same way that Emily is, hell, the same way that my mom is. I wanted you to know that.”

“Not that, I’ll keep yours,” Sammy said, smiling. “But thank you for that. You’re like the little brother I never had, too. But no –it’s this.”

Ben’s eyes widened when he realized that there were two rings on the chain, and Sammy unclasped it to slide Jack’s off, and put Ben’s back around his neck.

“Jack gave it to me,” Sammy said, and he didn’t care what the cameras and microphones caught, not anymore, not with Ben. “About a year before he disappeared. We knew we’d never – not unless we ran away, and then we didn’t do that. I kept it locked away for years after he was gone but – but I brought it with me. I want you to have it.”

“Sammy,” Ben said in a small, helpless voice, not taking the ring from Sammy’s outstretched hand. “That’s – that’s your _engagement_ ring, I can’t take that from you.”

“Well, I can’t take your father’s ring from you then,” Sammy said, making himself grin as if they were about to have a long, unnecessary argument about it, though Sammy felt like he could win Ben over in a couple of minutes. “Ben, Jack is gone. Has been gone for longer than I can think about. And soon, I’ll be gone, too. And you’re one of the only people in the world who knew about us. The only person I ever told. Just – take it. Please.”

“Don’t you dare say _to remember me by,”_ Ben said, giving Sammy a betrayed look but taking the ring all the same. Squinting at it, he slipped it onto his thumb, where it kind of fit.

“I just don’t want it to die with me,” Sammy said after a second. “Don’t want…I don’t know, the memory of him to die with me. I know you never knew him but –”

“You love him,” Ben said decisively, running a finger across the ring. “That’s good enough for me. But just know I’m planning on giving it back to you after you don’t die.”

“Ben, only one of us is making it through this, I’m just happy I got to see you again –” Sammy started helplessly, but Ben cut him off with a raised eyebrows and a fake glare.

“We’re both making it through this,” Ben said with that stubborn glint in his eye. “I have a plan.”

“Right,” Sammy said, remembering Ron’s last words to him. “You have a fucking plan. You wanna fill me in about what this plan of yours is? Because last I checked, the Hunger Games has _one_ Victor, not half a dozen.”

“Actually, this Hunger Games has twenty-four,” Ben said with a smug look on his face, and Sammy could honestly punch him if his hands weren’t already in horrible condition. “And I know –”

There was a sudden noise, and Sammy put an hand on Ben’s wrist to keep him from talking. “Did you hear that?”

“Probably just the trees rustling,” Ben said, an anxious look on his face all the same as the two of them stilled, surveying the surrounding area.

“No, I heard it again,” Sammy said, straining his ears. “It’s a voice. I think it’s – I think it’s calling my name?”

“Do you think everyone’s –” Ben started, but then there was a blood-curdling scream.

“Holy shit,” Sammy scrambled to his feet, Ben not far behind. “There’s no way half the arena didn’t hear that.”

“It sounded like Tim,” Ben said, his eyes going wide. He and Tim had been together up until now, Sammy knew, and Tim had been a little out of it. They’d been in the same cavern with Dan, and Tim had killed Dan with the machete while Ben ducked out of the way, and he’d had to convince Tim that he wasn’t an enemy, that he was an ally, all while Tim had a crazed look in his eye.

Tim hadn’t been altogether well in years, though Sammy thought being around Mary should help him. But now that Ben said it, it was definitely Tim screaming.

“C’mon,” Sammy pulled at Ben’s shirtsleeve and the two of them rushed toward the sound of the noise.

They found Tim and Mary a few minutes later, Tim on the ground with Mary leaning over him, begging “Please, Tim, please.”

“No!” Tim shielded his face with another scream, though quieter. “God, I don’t want to. No. _No_! You can’t! You can’t!”

Mary looked up at Sammy and Ben with tears in her eyes. “I don’t know what’s wrong with him – I can’t seem to help –”

Sammy was about to answer when he heard a cry that came from nowhere near him, one that shook him to his core that almost made him fall over with the weight.

_“Sammy? Sammy? Help me!”_

“Sammy!”

Sammy could kind of hear Ben through the fog that had entered his mind, could see his friend shaking him from above, but it was hard to focus on him, he seemed to be talking to him through water, or maybe molasses.

Sammy tried to push past Ben, tried to go in the direction of Jack’s voice – God, that sounded just like Jack, just like him, how was Jack here? Could the Capitol have put Jack in the Games, just to make Sammy suffer? They could have. They could have, fuck, they could have.

“Jack,” Sammy tried to say, tried to explain to Ben, but his voice kept coming out garbled. Why was it doing that? Why did he feel like this?

Suddenly, Ben wasn’t in front of him anymore, and instead it was someone else – who? It wasn’t Mary or Tim. It wasn’t Troy. Not Emily. Definitely not Jack. But it was someone, someone he knew and recognized, yelling something at him.

There was a sharp pain in one of his ears, and then Sammy realized that he the person had shoved something inside of it. He tried to groan in pain, but then the same sharp pain hit the other ear.

And then the world suddenly came back into focus and Herschel Baumgartner was standing in front of him with a pissed off look on his face – well, all of his looks were pissed off – and was pulling him somewhere, somewhere away from wherever they were now.

Sammy followed somewhat blindly, looking around for Ben, for the rest of his allies, and said something about Ben but then Herschel yanked him even harder, so he shut up.

He stumbled after Herschel for maybe ten minutes, only vaguely aware of the world around him; it was only when Herschel reached over and pulled whatever the fuck was in his ears out that Sammy really felt like he existed in this plane again.

“What the fuck?” Sammy asked groggily, feeling as if he’d just woken up from some horrific nightmare. “Herschel –?”

“Someone get him something to eat,” Herschel said a little gruffly. “Should help settle his stomach.”

“Settle my –” Sammy started, and then the bile in his throat started to come up and he retched into the grass next to him.

“Gross,” he heard Ben’s voice behind him, and then realized that not only was Ben here, but everyone – Emily, Troy, Mary, and Tim. Mary was on the ground across from him, leaning up against a tree with Tim’s head in her lap as he seemed to sleep. Ben and Emily were standing just behind him, and Emily had just knelt down to hand Sammy a piece of what looked like fish.

“What the hell just happened?” Sammy asked, forcing himself to sit up. They were still in the forest, but in a small grove area where Herschel seemed to have set up camp, since there were two packs strewn out around them and what seemed like an elaborately booby-trapped entrance made of fishnet.

 “Jabberjays,” Herschel said grimly. “They almost got me yesterday, but I made earplugs out of the tree leaves. I heard Tim screamin’ out all the way from my camp, so’s I scrambled to get to ya’. Ain’t no one deserve to hear Jabberjays.”

“Weren’t those engineered by the Capitol to repeat conversations?” Emily asked, a comforting hand on Sammy’s shoulder. “And haven’t they been retired from use?”

“That kind of use,” Herschel said darkly. “Now, the Capitol uses them to trick you into thinking you hear the voices of folks you care about. Tricked me by letting me hear my sweet Edna and she’s been gone near ten years now. Affects some folks worse than others – Tim here probably because he’s weak in the head and we all know it, don’t look at me like that, Mary. And Shotgun, you’ve been crying out for someone named Jack for damn near an hour now.”

“Oh,” Sammy said, a flush rising on his cheeks as he ate the piece of fish Emily brought him to avoid making eye contact with anyone.

Ben, from behind him, purposefully cleared his throat. “Well, I heard my mom, but it was faint and only for a second before Herschel got my ears plugged up, so it definitely affects everyone, I think it’s just…the speed of the effect.”

Sammy didn’t need to look at anyone to know that he’d probably gone down the rabbit hole ten seconds in, but he swallowed his fish and didn’t talk again.

“That Jack Wright?” Herschel, who had never heard of anything resembling tact, said a little too loudly. “Why Jack Wright? Hasn’t he been dead for years?”

“No,” Ben said defensively, “he hasn’t.”

Tension hung in the air, and it seemed as if all eyes were on Sammy. Feeling even sicker than he had before, Sammy laid down on the cool grass and closed his eyes before saying “Yeah. Jack Wright. He’s not dead. But he’s gone. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Whatever,” he heard Herschel mumble.

 “Herschel, where’s Cecil and Esther?” Troy asked, and Sammy was grateful someone changed the subject, but then suddenly anxiety spiked in his chest as he sat up again, giving Herschel his full attention.

Herschel sighed with a shake of his head. “Esther’s gone. She broke her foot first thing, falling into that cave thing, and I was taking care of her until Cynthia Higgenbaum killed her when she found her, and then I killed Cynthia. Hadn’t had time to find Cecil yet – still haven’t found him – so he doesn’t know. Don’t know what’s kinder, since her picture will be up tonight – hoping he’s already gone so he’ll never knew she went too, or hoping he’s alive but has to see that all on his own.”

Herschel got a melancholic look on his face, and then quickly busied himself with feeding everyone the fish he’d caught that day.

The pictures played somewhere close to an hour later – there was no Cecil. There was Janice, Pete, and Doyle, of course. There was Esther and Cynthia. And then there was Rose.

“Shit,” Hershel said. “Who the fuck managed to off Rose?”

“Maybe Pete Meyers,” Sammy said, a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. They were down to the top ten now, and seven of them were right here. It was a good thing tomorrow was the third day, because they would be running out of people to kill soon, and that wasn’t going to keep the Capitol off their scent at all. “Or Reagan Spears.”

“Go to sleep,” Emily said, wise as ever. “I’ll keep first watch, and we’ll figure out our next move come morning.”

Sammy didn’t need to be told twice. His hands were utterly useless, and his brain felt as if it had been beaten half to a pulp. He propped himself up against one of the larger rocks in Herschel’s little camp, and closed his eyes.

He didn’t even put up a fight when Ben pulled Sammy’s head onto his shoulder, or make any short jokes about just how far Sammy’s head had to drop down to reach his shoulder, which really was a testament to how hard the day had been.

* * *

 

“What are we gonna do with a group this big?” Mary asked that morning as Herschel handed out even more fish that he’d already caught that morning as their breakfast. “I mean, we can just stay in one place and wait for others to find us. That might be our best bet.”

“No,” Sammy said, and to his slight surprise, heard Ben and Herschel both echo him. He made quick eye contact with Ben before saying “I know what we need to do. I need you all to trust me.”

“Of course we trust you,” Troy began, but Ben quickly interrupted.

“ _Actually_ ,” Ben said, “I have a plan, and everyone needs to trust _me_.”

“Wrong,” Sammy said before anyone else could add their two cents. “It’s extremely important that we all follow _my_ plan, because it’s our best chance of survival.”

“ _My_ plan –” Ben started, but then dropped the attitude with a tilt of his head. “Wait? Do we have the same plan?”

“Does your plan…uh…involve…going east?” Sammy asked, because there was no way to avoid beating around the bush with that certain detail, as someone would figure it out eventually anyway, and it was at least slightly oblique.

“It does,” Ben said, his gaze narrowing. “How do you know what my plan is?”

“How do _you_ know what _my_ plan is?” Sammy shot back, but Herschel interrupted before they could devolve into their usual bickering. Neither of them had ever had a sibling growing up, which meant they spent a lot of time acting like children when they argued to make up for lost time.

“What does it matter? Maybe you both told each other and forgot about it. Are we going east or not?” Herschel glared at the two of them until they both nodded, assenting to the plan, though they elbowed each other a few times as they fought over who would lead the group forward.

Sammy was grateful on the fact that the group as a whole picked up on the fact that asking questions was a big no right now. They were on camera at all times, there was no hashing out the details, not of a plan like this.

But how the hell did Ben know the plan? Had Lily told him? Lily barely knew Ben, and didn’t like him anyway, so that made no sense – so who else had Lily gotten in on the plan that could have told Ben about it?

He and Ben made suspicious eye contact a time or two, but if they both knew the plan, then that was probably a good thing, though Sammy hoped that that didn’t mean Ben had any preconceived notions of saving Sammy’s life – Sammy was fully ready for today to be the last day of his life, to die making sure that Ben made it to safety.

“We’re going to have to hurry,” Sammy said around mid-afternoon when they were still hiking east. He knew it was due east because he’d had someone get up into the trees every couple hours to check that the directionality was still correct. “The sun sets in three hours.”

“You’ve kept close track,” Ben said, assessing eyes on Sammy.

“I assume that you’ve kept close track as well,” Sammy reminded Ben, and they glared at each other for half a second before Ben inserted himself into Sammy’s personal space to kick at his legs for a couple seconds. At least it wasn’t his hands, which still hurt like hell. That was something good about dying. His hands wouldn’t hurt anymore.

“It’s been too easy,” Ben muttered to Sammy about an hour before sunrise. He knew they were close to the edge – Emily had just climbed up to check, and she had good eyes, and could tell when the trees were real and when they were a digital projection, and could tell they were getting close to the end of the arena, that they’d hit the wall soon.

“What do you mean?” Sammy said, making sure no one else was listening in, because if anyone else could hear them, then microphones surely would. “There’s only three other tributes left.”

“Not talking about tributes,” Ben said, barely moving his lips. “Talking about mutations.”

“Already run into two,” Sammy said, but Ben’s point stood – there was surely going to be something else, the Capitol had to know something was going on outside of its purview. “Maybe we’ll get lucky.”

Ben gave him a disbelieving look, but they quieted after that, focused on getting as far as they could before sunset hit.

Ben’s theory proved correct, because the Capitol didn’t disappoint in their ability to be cruel and vindictive. The barking sounds began as sounding like terriers or something of the like, but it was only a few minutes later that they’d built to the crescendo of snarls and growling of a pack of wild coyotes.

“We’re gonna need to run,” Sammy told the group, eyes flashing up to the sky – shit, probably another fifteen minutes until sunset, fucking fuck, but hopefully that was enough time to get to the edge and distract the mutts. “Get ahead of me!”

He pushed everyone else ahead, but fucking Ben stayed in the back with him because of course he did. They were all jogging to start, but then a mutt tore through the trees with slobber hanging from his glinting white teeth, half a head taller than Ben and twice as wide.

“Oh, damn,” Mary whispered from next to Sammy, and Sammy turned her around and shoved her forward, hot on her heels as they ran at full speed.

“Sprint!” Troy shouted from where he was leading their group, and fuck, this wasn’t what they needed, another mutt tore through the trees with dark red eyes and it came toward them with twice the speed and ferocity as the other one.

“Fuck!” Sammy yelled, grabbing Ben and shoving him ahead of him. “Get to the edge, get to the fucking edge!”

They tore through the trees, Troy and Emily holding hands up front so as not to get separated, the fastest runners of all of them. Mary and Tim weren’t far behind, though Mary was half-pulling Tim with her. Herschel was behind them, old and out of breath but still viable as ever, cursing up a storm. Mary still had her longsword and Troy had the machete, but not using them would be the best option, especially because to use them, they had to be up close and personal to the mutts.

Ben and Sammy were mainly keeping pace with each other, except for the times they tried to make sure the other was a step ahead of them. Sammy despised Ben sometimes, he really did, he really fucking did –

“Shit!” He heard Emily curse up ahead. “This is the end, we can’t run any further! There’s a magnetic wall!”

“That’s the place!” Sammy shouted, and then turned and firmly planted a foot in the ground. Ben stopped short, desperately pulling at Sammy’s jacket.

“C’mon, you have to run, they’ll be here soon!” Ben said, but Sammy turned him with a shake of his head.

“I’ve got the shotgun,” Sammy said, brandishing the gun that he’d been carrying all day with a heavy heart, but his adrenaline sang as he loaded it, a thousand memories of using it coming back crystal clear. “I’ll hold them off. Get to the fucking edge and wait. Someone’s gonna blow a fucking hole in it soon enough, there’s nothing the Capitol can do to stop them.”

“Not without you,” Ben said, that fucking determination of his lighting up his face. No one could tell him no, especially not Sammy, but not this time.

One of the mutts interrupted their moment by launching itself in their direction with a snarl, but Sammy pulled the trigger and it fell to the ground with a whimper.

“Hey,” Sammy pulled Ben into a quick hug, being sure to watch for the other mutt approaching. There had to be at least five or six by now, all racing toward them to make sure they didn’t escape, but the only person they’d take with them was Sammy. “You’re my best friend. The brother I never had. I love you. And I need you to let me do what I came here for – die for you. This is that time, alright? You’ve got to let me go.”

“Please,” Ben said into Sammy’s shoulder, “you have to come with me. You have to. I’m not going without you.”

“Fuck,” Sammy cursed, letting go of Ben to fire off another shot as a mutt yowled in their direction. It hit their side, it wasn’t a good shot, but it held it off. “Alright, but we’ve gotta run because –”

The world exploded.

It wasn’t an exaggeration; everything around them seemed to light up as if it was burning. Sammy could see the trees around them lighting up, could see the grass burning beneath their feet, because there was a hole in the world, a gaping black hole in the midst of the trees.

Sammy wasn’t on his feet anymore – he’d been blown backwards without realizing it, felt like a dozen bones had broken in the fall – where had he fallen? Had he hit something? A mutt? A tree? He didn’t know for sure.

There was pain everywhere, but especially in his chest and stomach, and when he put a hand there, it came away bloody. Huh. That was interesting. He didn’t remember hitting it – didn’t remember much at all, could really just feel the pain, but it was also kind of numb. A numb sort of pain, maybe. He wasn’t sure.

Sammy could see something blurry out of the corner of his eye – oh, it was Ben. Ben’s face was bloody, but he was crawling toward Sammy, somewhere on the grass, even though the grass was on fire. What was Ben thinking? Ben was never thinking.

Sammy was pretty sure he was dying, and that thought didn’t scare him, but it didn’t make him happy either. It just made him sad, especially because the blood on Ben’s face was mixed with tears, and he had reached Sammy now, was holding onto him, a hand somewhere on his chest – oh, that must be where the wound was, he was trying to stop the blood flow, but it was too late, Sammy knew it even if Ben didn’t.

“Hey,” Sammy tried to say, the words barely coming out. He couldn’t really hear them anyway, they felt blurry and fuzzy all at once. “Hey, it’s alright. It’s alright, don’t cry.”

Ben said something that Sammy couldn’t hear. It was probably either something heartfelt or emotional or Ben was cussing him out. Sammy chose to believe the former.

He blinked a few times when he realized he was slipping away. He wanted to make sure that Ben was the last thing he saw. And that Jack was the last thing he thought of. That would make it worth it, dying while seeing Ben and thinking of Jack. A fitting ending.

He tried to tell that to Ben, but he didn’t think the words came out right.

He thought of Jack laughing at something he said at a gala when they were eighteen and didn’t know what the world was going to do to them, and Sammy thought he might have smiled.

The last thing he was going to do was smile – huh. He never would’ve guessed. Maybe his life had been worth something after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again. Not an MCD fic. There will be a fourth part. I have tagged correctly. No MCD. Await Part Four.


	4. Imagine this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew, okay, I finished it! I start another job tomorrow, so I wanted to get this done as soon as I could, and as you can see, it's much shorter than the other chapters and really more of an epilogue. But I hope it ties it up and that everyone enjoys it!
> 
> I could be convinced to do timestamps from the past and future, though. I will need very little convincing, I already have ideas, so this is definitely gonna have at least one or two accompanying pieces one of these days. Thanks for reading, hope you all enjoy the final part!

Sammy was peacefully drifting in some sort of dream state where everything felt hazy and slightly pleasant, like he was high enough above the rest of the world that everything seemed too far away to think about, like the way his eyes were heavy when he blinked them open, a sterile white ceiling overhead, the steady beeping of something nearby.

Unfortunately, as soon as he became aware of physical space, he became aware of a pocket of steady, throbbing pain somewhere in his body, though he wasn’t quite sure where yet.

Then he thought of Ben Arnold and he shot upward, gasping with a shock of electric pain going down his spine, his chest and stomach feeling as if they had just been lit on fire.

Sammy gasped for breath, looking at the room around him, his eyesight still not entirely back online yet, the details fuzzy for a couple of seconds until he blinked and realized he was in a white and grey room reminiscent of a hospital, like the hospital in the Capitol he’d been taken to after his Games a lifetime ago.

 _No, no, fuck, no._ Sammy pulled himself upward, noticed an IV in his arm, took a second before pulling it out – he remembered admonishing Ben for pulling an IV out once, when was that, probably right after Ben’s Games when Sammy bribed his way into the hospital, but Sammy was a do as I say and not as I do kind of person, so he felt justified in tearing out the IV.

That was when the pain really started, and Sammy realized that not only were his hands still bandaged, but his entire midsection was wrapped in a large gauze, that every time he moved a muscle his stomach churned in abject pain.

Sammy ignored that, though, stumbling upward and out of the room – the door was open, why would the Capitol leave the door open, he could get out that way, he could escape – and into a similarly white and grey narrow corridor.

Sammy stumbled with the effort to move, and then realized that it wasn’t just him that was moving, it was the whole corridor.

He wasn’t in the Capitol. He was on a ship.

What kind of ship, he had no fucking idea, maybe a Capitol ship bringing him away from the arena – but he didn’t care, couldn’t think about that now, could only think about –

Ben. Ben, face covered in blood, next to Sammy after the arena was destroyed.

The arena was destroyed.

Was this ship –

“Stevens, what the hell are you doing walking around? We had you on a morphine drip, for fuck’s sake.”

Sammy turned, wincing with the effort as another jolt of pain went through his ribs, to find Herschel glaring at him from the end of the corridor. Well, he looked healthy enough, his trademark pissed off expression unchanged, though his eyebrows looked a little singed.

Ron was next to him, though, his eyes heavy on Sammy in a way that was half-relieved, half-admonishing, and Sammy could have cried, he was so happy to see him.

“Hey there, idiot, get back to your bed,” Ron said gruffly, taking two large strides toward Sammy to help hold him up, which was greatly appreciated, as Sammy was pretty sure he was going to fall any second without it.

“You bastard,” Sammy said weakly as Ron pulled him back down the corridor and into the room he’d just come from, half-shoving him back onto the bed with a disgruntled but fond expression. “You fucking bastard. I told you to take care of Ben, not me, that I was going to die. I _promised_ Lily I was going to die. She’s gonna be so pissed at me when she finds out I’m alive.”

“You can’t honestly think I’m _angry_ at you for managing to survive,” Sammy turned his head slightly to see Lily herself in the doorway next to Herschel, the set of her face annoyed, but her eyes were softer than Sammy had ever seen in years, especially looking right at him. “Though I’m sure it wasn’t for lack of trying on your part. I may hate you, but I’m not actively rooting for your demise, you know. Trying to die on Ben’s behalf was noble, but not the smartest idea you’ve ever had.”

 “Ben,” Sammy said, eyes going wide, looking from Ron to Herschel to Lily, silently begging for one of them to give him an answer, the only answer he could bear to hear.

“Bad news,” Ron said, face neutral, and the pain Sammy felt had nothing to do with his wounds. “He got a nasty cut on his face and has been complaining about scarring damn near every time I’ve seen him.”

Sammy sank back onto his pillows, adrenaline rushing out of his system. “Bastard,” Sammy muttered in Ron’s direction but Ron just cracked a smile at him.

“Wait a second,” Sammy said, memories of the specific details of how he’d gotten here coming back to him, and they didn’t quite add up. “How are you here, Ron? Did Lily let you in on our plan, or…?”

Ron opened his mouth to answer, but it was Herschel who harrumphed from the doorway, glaring down at Sammy.

“Maybe, Stevens, if you ever stopped be an arrogant piece of shit long enough to actually _share_ your thoughts and feelings with others,” Herschel raised a meaningful eyebrow, “you would have realized that you and Little Miss Wright here weren’t the only people trying to break the Games this year.”

“What?” Sammy asked, exchanging a look with Lily, silently asking for an explanation. Lily shifted a little uncomfortably under the attention from Sammy, but she cleared her throat regardless.

“You asked me to help,” Lily said, shifty eyes going to Ron and Herschel as if admitting that she’d deigned herself to help Sammy Stevens of all people was tantamount to treason. “So I reached out to the only man in the Capitol I knew who was a part of the underground resistance movement – Ron.”

_“Break the arena,” Sammy whispered to Lily, lips barely moving, as they stood in the Capitol’s training facility’s hallway, where anyone could hear them if they tried to, but there was no other option for this conversation. “Get Ben and Emily and whoever else you can out. I’ll stay behind as bait for the Gamemakers. They’ll want to take me. But this is everyone else’s best chance. You’ve got friends here, too. Help them if you won’t help me. Jack would’ve wanted you to.”_

_Lily was expressionless, but Sammy knew that that didn’t mean she wouldn’t help. It meant she had been practicing her poker face for years now, so much it had become a natural part of her, as easy to slip on as a mask._

_“Third sunset,” Lily said, lips barely moving. “Straight east. The trees will look like they’re still there, but they’re digital. The wall hums. I’ve got a contact in the Resistance. He can get a ship to break it.”_

_“Save Ben,” Sammy said after a second’s hesitation. “If you can save anyone, save Ben. But don’t save me. Let me die – or let the Capitol take me. Maybe I’ll end up wherever Jack is.”_

“Ron’s your contact in the Resistance?” Sammy said, gazing at his mentor with new ideas as Ron shrugged, his smile unashamed. “Why the hell didn’t you –”

“It’s all top secret, hush-hush,” Ron explained, knowing Sammy well enough to realize that he didn’t like being kept in the dark about these kinds of things. “Lily reached out to me – she knew how to break the arena, but she needed a ship and a pilot to do it. I wouldn’t have had any clue where to turn, but there’s where Ben came in.”

“Ben?” Sammy groaned weakly, sinking further into the bed. “Of course Ben was involved. Of course.”

“He made contact with District Thirteen,” Ron said and Sammy’s eyes widened, his heart thumping uncomfortably in his chest. “Right before the Reaping. He gave me the contact information for a guy named Merv, I assume it’s a code name, and told me to make a plan to break the Games. This is Merv’s ship – he’s the pilot – we’re headed to Thirteen from here.”

Sammy leaned back, mind reeling. Thirteen. They were really going to Thirteen. They were really _alive_ – and going to Thirteen.

“I thought I told you both not to save me,” Sammy said, eyes going from Ron to Lily tiredly, but there was a steady thrum of affection in his chest buried underneath all that pain – mainly for Ron, but for Lily, too.

Lily snorted, half-glaring at him. “What would Jack say if I didn’t manage to pull you out of that mess?”

From the look on her face, and the raised eyebrow sent in her direction, Sammy could tell that it wasn’t just a figure of speech, that Lily physically had dragged Sammy’s body onto this ship.

He felt warm and not altogether unpleasant about it.

Ron, on the other hand, rolled his eyes. “Well, Ben told me that saving _you_ was the priority, and he’s a little more convincing than you. Luckily, I managed to get you both and Emily to boot. Three for three on my end, though others weren’t so lucky.”

“Who –” Sammy started, relief filtering through him at hearing that Emily was safe, but the dread he felt was just as strong.

Herschel grimaced. “Mary Lowing’s the only other Victor onboard. Couldn’t find Troy and Tim in the rubble – Cecil was nowhere near there, for all we know. And then there’s Pippa James and Reagan Spears. All either dead – or in the Capitol. Who knows?”

“Fuck,” Sammy said, a shiver going through his body. He hadn’t wanted this. He shouldn’t have been the one to make it. It should’ve been Troy instead. Or Tim, fuck, poor Mary, losing him all over again. “Where’s Ben? I’ve gotta – gotta see Ben –”

“Lay back down, you idiot,” Ron stepped forward to shove – well, lightly push but it felt like a shove – Sammy back down onto the bed. “You’ve got lacerations all over your chest and stomach from the claws of one of those mutts. You’re not moving for a while. I’ll go tell Ben you’re awake and _he_ can come see _you,_ got it? Lily, get that IV back in him.”

Sammy glared up at Lily while she took visible pleasure in piercing him with the needle, but he was distracted by a crash he heard in the hallway followed by a string of curses that surely came from Ben Arnold.

“Nice scar,” Sammy croaked as Ben appeared in the doorway, frantic but grinning as soon as he saw Sammy, and then tightening his mouth with another quick curse, because there was a long bloody scratch reaching from one of his temples across his nose and down to his chin.

“I hit my face on a rock,” Ben said with a straight face, one of his lips slightly twitching, before he practically threw himself at Sammy, making Sammy groan out in pain. “Your injuries are way worse, so don’t even talk.”

“Yeah, so don’t squeeze so tight,” Sammy said, letting go of Ben who gave him a concerned look, eyes searching for any other visible damages other than the obvious. “You’ll fuck with the bandages. At least I can hide mine.”

Ben’s eyebrows creased and he frowned as if he’d already thought of that a dozen times, so Sammy quickly added “Still handsome, though. I’m sure Emily’ll think it’s sexy.”

“She’s not awake yet,” Ben said, his smile strained but whole. “I was sitting up with her – I was with you earlier. I’ve been alternating. She got a piece of shrapnel in her stomach, we’re keeping her stable but she’ll need surgery once we get to…to Thirteen.”

“Thirteen,” Sammy echoed, not quite believing the words. “Finally going to Thirteen – just like you wanted.”

 _Just like Jack always wanted_ , Sammy thought but couldn’t say out loud, though the look he and Lily exchanged behind Ben’s back did the speaking for them.

Ben noticed it, looking between the two of them with narrowed eyes. “We’re going to Thirteen now. But we’re going back – going back for everyone. Including Jack.”

Sammy’s stomach churned and he leaned further back into his bed, squeezing his eyes closed. “Ben, no –”

Lily’s anger was palpable even though Sammy couldn’t see her. “What do you mean, go back for Jack? Jack is dead. We need go back – go back for Pippa and Reagan and Troy and Tim. Go back to take out the fucking Gamemakers and their puppet president. _They’re_ real, they matter. Jack is gone.”

“ _Someone_ needs to go back,” Sammy relented, putting an arm on Ben’s wrist, not quite together enough with his strength to squeeze as tightly as he wanted. “But not you. You’re running away to Thirteen – you and Emily finally have a chance to be happy. Don’t risk it for –”

“I’m not happy unless _you’re_ happy, you’d think you could grasp this by now,” Ben said, his face torn between annoyed and affectionate, as was usual with Ben, but it was Herschel who interrupted before Sammy could respond.

“This ain’t just about you, Shotgun,” Herschel said from where he’d stepped across the room to stand with Ron, who had a look of utmost pity on his face, whether for Ben or Sammy or both of them he wasn’t sure. “I’m goin’ back for Cecil no matter what any of you fuckers, here or in Thirteen, decide. And if Jack Wright or any of the others are where Cecil is, I’ll bust them, too.”

“See? Herschel’s leading a one man revolution,” Sammy said to Ben, whose mouth had set into a hard and stubborn line. “ _You_ don’t need to be involved.”

“Then what about you? What are you going to do? And you, Lily?” Ben’s eyes flashed between them, not angry but frustrated. “You have to do _something_.”

“I’m fighting against the Capitol,” Lily said, voice hard and tight. “I’ll save whoever’s left to save. But to think that Jack will just be there to be saved – it isn’t just idiotic, it’s dangerous.”

“He’s there,” Sammy said with a kind of finality, forever locked in a state of not letting himself to believe anything else or else he’d just fade and wither away. “So I’ll go for him, for everyone, but _not you_ , Ben.”

“I’m not letting you go alone and get yourself killed because you’re permanently on a suicide mission to save _someone_ , whether it’s me or Jack,” Ben said, stubborn as ever. “ _None of us_ will be safe until the Capitol is eradicated. And the first step of taking them down is getting the people we love back from them. That’s how we weaken their system – that’s how we start to tear it down. I’m not giving up, and I’m not letting either of you give him either.”

“Damn straight, Ben,” Ron said in that way of his that left no room for counterarguments. “We’ve got to band together to fight the power. That’s the only way _any_ of us get a happy ending.”

“I’m not arguing with that,” Lily said, raising her hands in mock defense. “I’m all for fighting the system.”

“It’s not even about that, though,” Ben said, turning from Lily to Sammy with earnest eyes that made him look so much younger. “It’s about Jack. It’s about – about protecting the people we love. None of us would have ever made it this far without someone protecting us. I would’ve been dead in my Games without Sammy – Sammy would’ve been dead without Ron. But saving Sammy gave Ron’s life meaning – and I know saving me gave Sammy’s life meaning. So stop feeling sorry for yourselves, and goddammit, Sammy, stop trying to die for love and _live for it_ instead.”

Ben looked at Sammy expectantly, wide and hopeful and endlessly bright eyes, and Sammy had never, ever been able to say no to Ben.

 “Your call, Shotgun,” Herschel said with a grin that was more affectionate than Sammy had ever seen from him. Ron was giving Sammy that pitying look, but there was a strength in the hold of his gaze, too.

He turned to look at Lily, who rolled her eyes back into her head. “We have to go back to the Capitol anyway. It would be…thorough of us to check. Just in case.”

Sammy sighed through his nose before giving Ben a small and helpless smile. “Well, you’re gonna do it no matter what I say, so –”

“Of course I am,” Ben said, his grin wider than Sammy had ever seen it, and Ben hugged the breath out of him all over again.

There was probably something to be said, Sammy thought, to living for something. He’d spent so long thinking about dying for what he loved, he’d never really considered the alternative. He had no idea if he could find Jack again, if Jack would be anywhere close to alright – but he could live for Ben right now, and hope he could live for Jack someday too.

It wasn’t perfect, but it could be enough for today.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [the worst kind of forever](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15637320) by [DrowningInStarlight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DrowningInStarlight/pseuds/DrowningInStarlight)




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